Impact of the Collection Mode on Salaried Labour Income Data: Evidence From Colombia Before and During the COVID-19 Pandemic

The strict confinement implemented by the National Government of Colombia in 2020 to contain the expansion of the COVID-19 pandemic created challenges in data collection operations conducted through household surveys. As a result, surveys that traditionally relied on face-to-face collection methods transitioned to a remote mode using telephone surveys. We exploit a quasi-experimental design based on the geographical-temporal exogenous variation in the collection mode of the leading household survey for the Colombian labour market and the linkage of this survey to the nationwide social security administrative record to measure the impact of the change in the collection mode on the reported salaried labour income. We find that the change in collection mode reduces the measured salaried labour income by approximately 4.4 percentage points and increases its variance and dispersion, with differences between population groups. These findings have implications for the development of mixed data collection methods and the analysis of income-based statistics.