Definitions and Questionnaires 2001
Chapter 4:
Household definitions
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Access to telecommunication systems
Access to telecommunication systems measures whether residents in a private dwelling have access to telephone, fax and or the internet, to communicate with people outside the dwelling and to use services provided through these media. This requires the machine to be in working order and for there to be a working connection.
Household
A household is either one person who usually resides alone or two or more people who usually reside together and share facilities (such as eating facilities, cooking facilities, bathroom and toilet facilities, a living area).
Household characteristics
A general term referring to the nature of a household including: number of household members, household composition, number of children in the household by age, and total household income.
Household composition
The derived variable that classifies households according to the presence, number and type of family nuclei, and the presence of related and unrelated people.
Number of motor vehicles
Number of motor vehicles is the number of motor vehicles which are mechanically operational, but not necessarily licensed or having a current warrant of fitness, that are available for private use by the usual residents of private dwellings.
Motor vehicles include:
- cars, station-wagons, vans, trucks, four-wheel drive vehicles and other vehicles used on public roads
- business vehicles available for private use by people in the dwelling
- vehicles hired or leased, and
- vehicles temporarily under repair.
They do not include:
- motor bikes or scooters
- vehicles used only for business
- farm vehicles not licensed for road use
- vehicles that belong to visitors
- vehicles occasionally borrowed from another household.
Sector of landlord
Sector of landlord is the institutional unit to which the owners of rented or leased private dwellings belong. Landlord refers to the type of organisation or person from whom households rent or lease private occupied dwellings.
Sources of household income
This variable identifies the various sources from which a household received their total household income.
In the census, it is generally only realistic to collect money income. This is what the individual respondent can normally recall or can readily retrieve from their financial records.
Money income is money flow from the deployment of one's labour, entrepreneurial skills and assets, and transfers received. The concept of money income therefore relies on identifying the sources from which money income is derived.
Excluded is income in kind, imputed, unrealised and contingent. Contingent income is that which depends on the unknown outcome of a course of action, eg suing. Money received by borrowing, making withdrawals from savings and receiving repayments of loan principal are excluded. Tax credits and reimbursements of expenses are also excluded.
Tenure of household
Tenure of household refers to the nature of the occupancy of a private household in a dwelling, at the time of the survey. Tenure of household seeks to ascertain if the household rents or owns the dwelling and whether payment is made by the household for that right. It does not refer to the tenure of the land on which the dwelling is situated.
Total household income
Total household income is derived by aggregating the total personal income of all members of the household.
Weekly rent paid by households
Weekly rent paid by households is the total weekly monetary amount spent by the household on obtaining shelter in a private dwelling.
Ideally the weekly rent paid should exclude payments for the use of furniture and utilities such as electricity, gas and water and for the provision of special services like washing, cooking, etc.