Challenges in the Treatment of Unit Nonresponse for Selected Business Surveys: A Case Study

Abstract

Probability sample selection procedures gift methodologists with quite a bit of control before data collection. Unfortunately, not all sample units respond and those that do will not always provide data on every questioned characteristic, which can lead to biased estimates of totals. In this paper, we focus entirely on the challenges of mitigating nonresponse bias effects in business surveys, using empirical examples from one survey to illustrate challenges common to many programs.