Austrian Central Social Security Register (CSSR)

Summary

Strengths: Because administrative data are used for determining eligibility and benefit amounts for social insurance programs, they are subject to stringent quality control procedures and data are very reliable. The data has an (almost) universal coverage and is both cross-sectional and longitudinal. Weaknesses: As the data are limited to information required for program administration, they are restricted in scope and do not include broader variables of interest to the research community. A prime problem is the lack of socio-economic characteristics of the persons (i.e. educational attainment, working hours, family affiliation). This drawback can be overcome by matching social security data with other datasets (i.e. an unemployment register which contains information on education and family status; tax registry data on gross yearly income, paid taxes, extra compensation and seniority bonuses or with the Microcensus). A further disadvantage is that data handling is relatively complex.

Type of data

Data Source
Registry

Type of Study
Other: Registry

Data gathering method
Other: Administrative records of individuals recieving social security benefits. Insurance providers that are legally obliged to do so submit personal information on individuals who have applied for and who receive benefits.

Access to data

Conditions of access

Type of available data (e.g. anonymised microdata, aggregated tables, etc.)
Anonymised microdata

Formats available

Coverage

Coverage Years of collection, reference years, and sample sizes
i. Different data series included in the CSSR have been collected for varying numbers of years, with the earliest data collection in (more or less) its current format dating back 21 years (1992) ii. NA Iii. The sample is made up of the entire Austrian population registered with the Central National Registry and with the CSSR. Currently the data set contains information of about 10 million individuals with 56 million insurance spells (Versicherungszeiten).

First year of collection
1972

Stratification if applicable
NA

Base used for sampling

Geographical coverage and breakdowns
By state (Bundesland)

Age range
No age range specified

Statistical representativeness
Population representative

Coverage of main and cross-cutting topics
Data collected on: (a)Labour market status and monthly salary, (b)health insurance (Insured and services), (c)pension insurance (insured and pensions), (d)accident insurance (insured, accidents at work, services), (e)long-term care benefits (a) Labour market status and monthly salary: employment status and monthly salary levels by region, age, gender and nationality. (b) Health insurance: eligible persons; persons insured by the federal health insurance fund by type of insurance, by state and insurance areas, by insurance providers, and by state and gender; insured status of self-employed and regularly employed persons; health insurance for farmers; sick leave; service costs of the health insurance fund (c) Pension insurance: pension status by gender, all pensions received and amounts, pension provider, and by state; self-employed and regularly employed persons receiving pension benefits; status of the pensioner by age; status of pensioners by capacity and reduced capacity to work; newly awarded pension benefits by age (d) Accident insurance: recognized accident insurance claims by insurance provider and category of insured persons, recognized road and labour accident insurance claims, disabilty benefits by age and gender (e) Long-term care benefits: beneficiaries of long-term care allowances by level of care (1-7), region, gender, age, as well as annual expenditure on long-term care benefits provided by both federal and state governments from 2000 to 2012. Statistik Austria provides additional information on the full cost of long-term care services by care type (in-patient, out-patient, home care, day care) and by region Corresponds to: Social Systems and Welfare and Work and Productivity topics

Linkage

Standardisation

Possibility of linkage among databases
Linkage is possible with the Central Population Register (CPR), Tax Register (TR), the Unemployment Register (UR), the Register of Educational Attainment (EAR), Business Register of Enterprises including their local units (BR) and Housing Register of buildings and dwellings (HR).

Data quality

Entry errors if applicable
Not reported

Breaks
Not reported

Consistency of terminology or coding used during collection
Not reported

Governance

Contact information
Main Association of Austrian Social Security Institutions (Hauptverband der Österreichischen Sozialversicherungsträger)
Main Association of Austrian Social Security Institutions
Kundmanngasse 21
1031 Wien Austria Phone: 4301711320
Email: posteingang.allgemein(at)hvb.sozvers.at
Url: Aggregate tables: http://www.hauptverband.at/portal27/portal/hvbportal/channel_content/cmsWindow?action=2&p_menuid=58267&p_tabid=2

Timeliness, transparency
Reports published annually for the previous year's data