Data Files

Core surveys include the Canadian Community Healthy Survey (CCHS), General Social Survey (GSS), Census (1991 to 2016), Labour Force Survey (LFS), Canadian Health Measures Survey (CHMS), Ontario Child Health Study (OCHS), Survey of Household Spending (SHS), Aboriginal Peoples Survey (APS) and more.

Administrative data files include the Canadian Cancer Registry (CCR), Canadian Vital Statistics Database (CVSD), Longitudinal Administrative Databank (LAD - T1FF tax file), Longitudinal Immigration Database (IMDB) and Employment Insurance Status Vector (EISV) and more.

Linked administrative data include:

• CCHS linked to DAD (In patient stay)
• CCHS linked to NACRS (Emergency and day surgery)
• CCHS linked to OMHRS (Ontario Mental Health Reporting system)
• CCHS linked to IMDB
• CCHS linked to Census 2016
• CCHS linked to CVSD (Death)
• IMDB linked to DAD
• Census linked to DAD
• And more

Business Research Microdata (BRM) 2000-2017

• ‘Core’ firm level variables
• Based on Statistics Canada’s Business Register, T2 tax records, T4 slips and others

Please contact McMaster RDC staff for a complete list or more information.

 

 

How does a master file differ from a public use microdata file?

The master files in the RDC differ in several ways from the ‘public’ files which are more widely available to the McMaster research community through the Data Liberation Initiative (DLI). For instance, compared to a Public Use Microdata File (PUMF) available through Data & Statistics, a master file will often contain the full sample of respondents (not a sub-set), additional categories in variables such as income, education and ethnicity, lower levels of geography (such as the census tract or dissemination area), discrete values for certain variables (such as age or the exact body weight of a respondent) or other concepts not available in the PUMF. In addition, the master files contain derived variables and bootstrap weights used to calculate variance. RDC access is useful for analytical work when a PUMF may not exist, may not provide access to sensitive variables needed for analysis, or when longitudinal data linkage is required.