How to import CPS/ASEC data into Stata

[Suzy Hanniga]

I am trying to import the 1998 data from the CPS/ASEC website. The three forms it comes in are DOS/Windows, GNU gzip, and Standard Unix. How do I input any of these forms of data into Stata?

[Mike Murphy]

Files are in ASCII format, so if you're using a Windows machine, download that data then you can use

import delim

or

infix

[Daniel Feenberg]

You might find the the IPUMS CPS project website (https://cps.ipums.org/cps/) a blessing. The system produces only ASCII fixed column-format data, but with each extract it generates SAS, SPSS, and STATA command files to read the data into one of those statistical packages.

[Suzy Hanniga]

If I am working a Mac will these codes not work?

[Daniel Feenberg]

Stata for Mac can read ASCII files with exactly the same commands as Stata for Linux or Stata for Windows, if that is your question. The IPUMS downloads will be very easy to deal with, that is why I suggested them.