Population: The reference population of EU-SILC is defined as all private households and all persons aged 16 and over within the household residing in the territory of the Member States at the time of data collection. Persons living in collective households and in institutions are generally excluded from the target population. For practical reasons, small parts of the national territory may also not be covered in the survey (e.g. the French Overseas Departments and territories; Scotland north of the Caledonian Canal and the Scilly Islands)
Survey Period: EU-SILC is an annual statistic and was launched in 2004 in 13 Member States (BE, DK, EE, EL, ES, FR, IE, IT, LU, AT, PT, FI and SE) and in NO and IS. From 2005 onwards the data are available for all EU25 Member States and IS and NO. TR, RO, BG and CH have launched EU-SILC in 2006.
Survey Method: EU-SILC data are collected by National Statistical Institutes and could come from different sources. In some participant countries a new survey was launched with cross-sectional and longitudinal elements. In other countries a combination of registers and surveys is used, that is the data for the same respondents are collected partly by interview and partly from register.
Topics: EU-SILC provides cross-sectional and longitudinal microdata on income, poverty, social exclusion and living conditions. Topics covered by EU-SILC at the household level are basic information, income, social exclusion and housing. At the individual level the topics are basic demographic information, education, labour information, health and income. The income data is typically collected for the income reference year preceding the date of the survey and follows international standards.
Data Access: The current legal framework enables access to anonymized microdata available at Eurostat only for scientific purposes (Commission Regulations (EC) No 831/2002; (EC) No 1104/2006; (EC) No 1000/2007; Council Regulation 322/97), however the access is restricted to universities, research institutes, national statistical institutes, central banks inside the EU, as well as to the European Central Bank. Individuals cannot be granted direct data access. For detailed information concerning data access, costs and how to submit an access request see:http://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/documents/203647/203698/How_to_apply_for_microdata_access.pdf/82d98876-75e5-49f3-950a-d56cec15b896
Atkinson, Anthony B.; Guio, Anne-Catherine; Marlier, Eric (Eds.) 2017: Monitoring Social Inclusion in Europe. [link]
Atkinson, Anthony B.; Marlier, Eric (Eds.) 2010: Income and living conditions in Europe. [link]
Frick, Joachim R.; Krell, Kristina (2010): Measuring Income in Household Panel Surveys for Germany: A Comparison of EU-SILC and SOEP. SOEPpapers No. 265. Berlin: DIW. [link]
Goedemé, T., (2010): The standard error of estimates based on EU-SILC. An exploration through the Europe 2020 poverty indicators, CSB Working Paper Series, WP 10/09, Antwerp, Herman Deleeck Centre for Social Policy, University of Antwerp. [link]
Hauser, Richard (2007): Probleme des deutschen Beitrags zu EU-SILC aus der Sicht der Wissenschaft – Ein Vergleich von EU-SILC, Mikrozensus und SOEP. SOEPpapers. No. 69. Berlin: DIW. [link]
Lohmann, Henning (2011): Comparability of EU-SILC survey and register data: The relationship among employment, earnings and poverty. Journal of European Social Policy February 2011 21: 37-54 [link]
Mysíková, M., (2011): Income Inequalities within Couples in the Czech Republic and European Countries. IES Working Paper 4/2011. IES FSV. Charles University. [link]
Schneider, Silke; Müller, Walter (2009): Measurement of Education in EU-SILC – Preliminary Evaluation of Measurement Quality. Equalsoc Working Papers. [link]
Wirth, Heike; Pforr, Klaus (2022): The European Union Statistics on Income and Living Conditions after 15 Years. European Sociological Review. [link]
Until recently, Eurostat has been releasing EU-SILC data files in a combined format with all countries in one user data base. Since October 2017, the raw csv-files are only available as separated by country and year. In order to cumulate the separated files for one specific year, you can use the following syntax to transform separated country csv-files into one csv-file.
These do-files have been prepared by Valentina Ponomarenko
Contact: eu-microdata(at)gesis(dot)org
EU-SILC covers a wide array of variables collected from households by the Member States. Among others, EU-SILC contains panel data that follows a rotational design. Each year, Eurostat publishes a series of separate datasets covering only up to 4 years, even though it has been collecting data since 2003. “eusilcpanel” is a script written by Marwin Borst in the form of a Stata package (eusilcpanel.ado; eusilcpanel.sthlp; totalpopulation.dta), that is able to merge these chunks of data into one cumulative dataset (separately for the D-,H-,R- and P-data). The script makes the EU-SILC panel more accessible to researchers in the vast majority of cases, but it can’t deal with data from all countries. Please acknowledge the work of Marwin Borst by citing both the program and the paper.
The steps necessary to cumulate the longitudinal data as well as a description of the Stata script are documented in:
Borst, Marwin (2018): EU-SILC Tools: eusilcpanel. First computational steps towards a cumulative sample based on the EU-SILC longitudinal datasets. GESIS Papers 2018/11, Mannheim. [link] (779 kB)
Borst, Marwin (2018): eusilcpanel stata package (12,47 kB)
Contact: Marwin Borst
The eusilcpanel stata package was developed to operate on EU-SILC csv-files that have been delivered by Eurostat in a combined format with all countries in one user data base. Since October 2017, Eurostat delivers EU-SILC csv-files separated by country. In order to be able to apply the eusilcpanel stata package on the new format, you can use the following do-files to transform separated country csv-files into one csv-file for every release.
2005-2016_panel_csv.zip (17,80 kB)
These do-files have been prepared by Valentina Ponomarenko
Contact: eu-microdata(at)gesis(dot)org
Syntax to generate ESeC and ESeG using EU-SILC-SPSS, R or Stata Systemfiles
The Syntax for SPSS, Stata and R can be downloaded in MISSY: ESEC - European Socioeconomic Classification in EU-SILC (click on the ESeC tab)
For details on ESeC please visit the homepage of Eric Harrison
The Syntax for SPSS, Stata and R can be downloaded in MISSY: ESEG - European Socioeconomic Groups in EU-SILC (click on the ESeG tab)
For details on ESeG please see Meron, Monique et al (2014)
These syntax files were prepared by Heike Wirth, Judith Gilsbach and Anika Herter
Descriptive information on ESeC (52 kB)
Descriptive information on ESeG (40 kB)
Contact: Heike Wirth
The do-file is discussed in the following article and working papers.
