Current Population Surveys: Uniform October Files, 1968-1990 (ICPSR 6126)
Version Date: Jun 30, 2026 View help for published
Principal Investigator(s): View help for Principal Investigator(s)
Robert M. Hauser
Series:
https://doi.org/10.3886/ICPSR06126.v2
Version V2 (see more versions)
Summary View help for Summary
This data collection consists of a "uniform" set of Current Population Surveys (CPS) October files. The October files contain the core questions included in every CPS as well as a supplemental series of questions on school enrollment. This extract makes data on school retention and enrollment accessible across all publicly available years. Records contain information for each individual between the ages of 3 and 34 years and for the head of household and the spouse of the head of household.
Citation View help for Citation
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Funding View help for Funding
Subject Terms View help for Subject Terms
Geographic Coverage View help for Geographic Coverage
Smallest Geographic Unit View help for Smallest Geographic Unit
city
Distributor(s) View help for Distributor(s)
Time Period(s) View help for Time Period(s)
Date of Collection View help for Date of Collection
Data Collection Notes View help for Data Collection Notes
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Specific information regarding differences about the reference person can be found in the P.I. Codebook after the table of contents.
Study Purpose View help for Study Purpose
The research team created an enhanced version of the annual October Current Population Surveys (CPS) from the late 1960s through the early 1990s. The October CPS was one of two major, federal sources of timely information on school enrollment; the other was the set of institutionally-based surveys of the National Center for Educational Statistics (NCES). This project began with the process of matching children's October CPS records to those of adult household members for the period 1968 to 1986 (additional years were added when the data became available) and of creating an enhanced, uniformly formatted series of October CPS files that could be used to analyze distribution and change in educational outcomes. In addition to the standard information on school enrollment, grade completion, and basic demographic characteristics, the enhanced files included the complete demographic, social, and economic characteristics of the householder and the spouse of the householder (if any) in the household in which the school-age individual resided, and it included other household variables, like the number of children residing in the household. These linkages permitted the research team to specify the age, education, labor force status, and occupation of adults in the household, who in most cases were the parents of school-age children. The enhanced October CPS files provide a rich and comparable set of repeated, cross-section measurements of the schooling process and of factors affecting the risk of school failure.
Study Design View help for Study Design
Please see Appendix B in the P.I. Codebook for an overview of the procedure used to construct the uniform file.
Sample View help for Sample
Probability sample.
Universe View help for Universe
Civilian noninstitutional population of the United States living in housing units and members of the armed forces living in civilian housing units on a military base or in a household not on a military base. The extract includes all individuals in such households aged 3-34 years.
Unit(s) of Observation View help for Unit(s) of Observation
Data Source View help for Data Source
United States Bureau of the Census annual Current Population Surveys October files
Data Type(s) View help for Data Type(s)
HideOriginal Release Date View help for Original Release Date
1994-05-20
Version History View help for Version History
2026-06-30
Variable labels and value labels were added or corrected based on the information provided in the P.I. Codebook and Appendices.
The full product suite and SDA were created for all datasets.
2018-02-15 The citation of this study may have changed due to the new version control system that has been implemented. The previous citation was:
- Hauser, Robert M. Current Population Surveys: Uniform October Files, 1968-1990. ICPSR06126-v2. Ann Arbor, MI: Inter-university Consortium for Political and Social Research [distributor], 2026-06-30. http://doi.org/10.3886/ICPSR06126.v2
2006-01-12 All files were removed from dataset 27 and flagged as study-level files, so that they will accompany all downloads.
2006-01-12 All files were removed from dataset 34 and flagged as study-level files, so that they will accompany all downloads.
2006-01-12 All files were removed from dataset 32 and flagged as study-level files, so that they will accompany all downloads.
2006-01-12 All files were removed from dataset 36 and flagged as study-level files, so that they will accompany all downloads.
2006-01-12 All files were removed from dataset 30 and flagged as study-level files, so that they will accompany all downloads.
2006-01-12 All files were removed from dataset 25 and flagged as study-level files, so that they will accompany all downloads.
2006-01-12 All files were removed from dataset 29 and flagged as study-level files, so that they will accompany all downloads.
2006-01-12 All files were removed from dataset 46 and flagged as study-level files, so that they will accompany all downloads.
2006-01-12 All files were removed from dataset 39 and flagged as study-level files, so that they will accompany all downloads.
2006-01-12 All files were removed from dataset 37 and flagged as study-level files, so that they will accompany all downloads.
2006-01-12 All files were removed from dataset 42 and flagged as study-level files, so that they will accompany all downloads.
2006-01-12 All files were removed from dataset 44 and flagged as study-level files, so that they will accompany all downloads.
2006-01-12 All files were removed from dataset 40 and flagged as study-level files, so that they will accompany all downloads.
2006-01-12 All files were removed from dataset 33 and flagged as study-level files, so that they will accompany all downloads.
2006-01-12 All files were removed from dataset 26 and flagged as study-level files, so that they will accompany all downloads.
2006-01-12 All files were removed from dataset 31 and flagged as study-level files, so that they will accompany all downloads.
2006-01-12 All files were removed from dataset 35 and flagged as study-level files, so that they will accompany all downloads.
2006-01-12 All files were removed from dataset 24 and flagged as study-level files, so that they will accompany all downloads.
2006-01-12 All files were removed from dataset 28 and flagged as study-level files, so that they will accompany all downloads.
2006-01-12 All files were removed from dataset 38 and flagged as study-level files, so that they will accompany all downloads.
2006-01-12 All files were removed from dataset 43 and flagged as study-level files, so that they will accompany all downloads.
2006-01-12 All files were removed from dataset 45 and flagged as study-level files, so that they will accompany all downloads.
2006-01-12 All files were removed from dataset 41 and flagged as study-level files, so that they will accompany all downloads.
1994-05-20 ICPSR data undergo a confidentiality review and are altered when necessary to limit the risk of disclosure. ICPSR also routinely creates ready-to-go data files along with setups in the major statistical software formats as well as standard codebooks to accompany the data. In addition to these procedures, ICPSR performed the following processing steps for this data collection:
- Checked for undocumented or out-of-range codes.
Notes
These data are freely available to data users at ICPSR member institutions. The curation and dissemination of this study are provided by the institutional members of ICPSR. How do I access ICPSR data if I am not at a member institution?
This study is provided by ICPSR. ICPSR provides leadership and training in data access, curation, and methods of analysis for a diverse and expanding social science research community.