U.S. Participation in the Development of a Transnational Database on Family Income

卢森堡收入研究(LIS)是一个国际社会科学联盟，目前有14个工业化国家参加，这些国家同意汇集生活在不同经济体中的家庭收入的微观数据。这样提供的数据在统计上具有可比性，并存储在卢森堡的一个中央设施中，研究人员可以在那里现场访问，也可以通过计算机化的电信网络远程访问。LIS数据库提供了丰富的资源，用于对收入分配、现金和非现金收入转移系统、不同人口群体的经济福祉相对水平以及现在或不久将成为世界范围内社会关注的许多其他主题进行多方面分析。财团成员国在分摊费用的基础上为数据设施提供支助。由美国国家科学基金会提供的资金构成了美国对该联盟的参与，这些资金有助于确保LIS数据库对美国社会科学家的潜在价值将得到实现。需要所有成员国的充分合作，以保证数据检索的可行性，保持高标准的数据质量，并逐步放宽对某些类型数据分析的方法限制。国家科学基金会的资金不仅代表了美国在该项目上的合作，还确保了美国参与所有重要的发展决策，并帮助抵消了数据库维护和更新的成本。

The Luxembourg Income Study (LIS) is an international social science consortium currently participated in by 14 industrialized nations which have agreed to pool microdata on the incomes of families living within their divergent economies. The data so furnished are made statistically comparable and stored at a central facility in Luxembourg, where they may be accessed by researchers either on-site or remotely through a computerized telecommunications network. The LIS database provides a rich resource for multifaceted analyses of income distributions, of systems of cash and noncash income transfers, of relative levels of economic well-being across different demographic groupings, and of many other topics which are now, or soon will be, of worldwide societal concern. Support for the data facility is provided by consortium member nations on a shared-cost basis. Funds provided by the National Science Foundation constitute United States participation in the consortium, and these funds help assure that the potential value of the LIS database to U.S. social scientists will be realized. The full cooperation of all member nations is required in order to guarantee feasibility of data retrieval, maintenance of high standards of data quality, and gradual relaxation of methodological constraints on certain types of data analysis. National Science Foundation funds not only represent U.S. cooperation in the enterprise, they also assure U.S. involvement in all important developmental decisions as well as helping to offset the costs of database mantenance and update.