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WERS Time-Series Dataset 1980-2004
The WERS Time-Series Dataset is formed from the interviews with the main management respondent in each of the five cross-section surveys (1980, 1984, 1990, 1998 and 2004). The dataset contains a wide range of data items from throughout the 1998 or 2004 management questionnaires for which there are also comparable items in at least one other previous cross-section survey in the WERS series.
None of the information obtained from interviews with worker representatives or from employees’ self-completion questionnaires is currently incorporated in the dataset. However, the dataset does draw upon the responses from the 1990 survey of financial managers, in which selected questions from the main interview were asked of this respondent instead of the personnel manager. It also draws upon the 1991 Employers’ Manpower and Skills Practices Survey (EMSPS), which returned to 88% of the workplaces in WIRS 1990 to ask additional questions about recruitment practices, training and other activities.
This time-series dataset makes the most of the continuity present within the survey series by providing direct comparisons of employment relations practice at five specific points in time over the past two decades. It is therefore possible to investigate the degree of change or stability in the incidence of specific practices over time, both in aggregate and within particular sectors of the economy or types of workplace. One can also assess the extent to which historical relationships – such as that between workplace size and union presence, for example - have changed over the period of observation.
Published analyses based on Version 1 of the dataset (incorporating the first four surveys in the WERS series) can be found in:
- Millward N, Forth J and Bryson A (1999) “Changes in employment relations, 1980-1998”, in M Cully, S Woodland, A O’Reilly and G Dix, Britain at Work: As Depicted by the 1998 Workplace Employee Relations Survey, London: Routledge.
- Millward N, Bryson A and Forth J (2000) All Change at Work? British Employment Relations 1980-1998, as portrayed by the Workplace Industrial Relations Survey series, London: Routledge.
The second of these two publications also contains an overview of the methodology employed in each of the first four surveys in the series.
Aside from the addition of a fifth time-point, this version of the dataset (Version 2.3) is largely the same as the original version (v1.1) used in the publications cited above and the subsequent minor revision (v1.2) deposited with the UK Data Archive in May 2002. However, a small number of improvements have been made to enhance the consistency of variable definitions and to expand the range of variables incorporated within the dataset.
The main time-series dataset (WIRSTS25.*) contains 9,697 unique records, comprising all of the workplaces surveyed in the 1980, 1984 and 1990 cross-section surveys together with all 1,929 workplaces with 25 or more employees surveyed in 1998 and all 1,648 workplaces with 25 or more employees surveyed in 2004. A second version (WIRSTS10.*) contains 4,253 records, comprising all 2,191 workplaces surveyed in 1998 and all 2,062 workplaces with 10 or more employees surveyed in 2004. Workplaces with fewer than 5-9 employees that were interviewed as part of the 2004 survey are excluded from the deposit.
The time-series dataset also contains a link variable (TEUKLEMS) that enables observations to be linked to the EU KLEMS industry-level database, which provides measures of economic growth, productivity, employment creation, capital formation and technological change at the industry level for the UK from 1970 onwards. Further information can be found at the EU KLEMS Project web page.
Further information about the time-series dataset, including details of how the dataset was compiled, as well as advice on analysing the data, is provided in the user guide, available to download here.
The user guide also contains a variable map, listing each of the time-series variables that appear within the deposited dataset, along with their source questions in each survey in the series and any notes concerning comparability over time.
For reference purposes, the SPSS syntax files used to compile the time-series dataset are also available; these can be found within the zip file containing the time-series data files, deposited with the Economic and Social Data Service.
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