What are the Confidential NLSY Geocode Data?
To protect respondent confidentiality, the NLS public-use files do not include geographic variables such as state, county, and metropolitan area. Such variables, when combined with the rich longitudinal records of respondents’ significant life events, would create an unacceptable risk that someone could use the data to identify individual respondents. Instead, BLS has established a licensing system through which legitimate researchers at universities and other research organizations in the United States can use NLS data with geographic information at their own facilities, provided that the research project and physical and electronic security measures described in the NLS geocode application are approved by BLS. NLSY79, NLSY79 Young Adult or NLSY97 Geocode files include the state, county, and metropolitan area of residence for each respondent in each survey year. Geocode data is also available for any of the Original Cohorts.
