Sample surveys are often affected by missing observations and non-response caused by the respondents' refusal or unwillingness to provide the requested information or due to their memory failure. In order to substitute the missing data, a procedure called imputation is applied, which uses the...

This dissertation is a collection of three stand-alone research papers. Thereby, the class of local polynomial matching estimators is the central object of investigation. The first essay concentrates on applying local polynomial matching methods in order to account for missing data when...

Using data on annual individual labor income from three representative panel datasets (German SOEP, British BHPS, Australian HILDA) we investigate a) the selectivity of item non-response (INR) and b) the impact of imputation as a prominent post-survey means to cope with this type of measurement...