Aggregating across dimensions

Price indexes are often aggregated over multiple dimensions. Matched sample indexes that use sequential Poisson sampling to draw a sample of businesses are a good example, as there are usually take-all and take-some strata in addition to, say, an industry classification.

Let’s extend vignette("piar") by adding another dimension to the classification to say if a business belongs to the take-all or take-some sampling stratum.

library(piar)

elementals <- ms_prices |>
  transform(
    relative = price_relative(price, period = period, product = product)
  ) |>
  elemental_index(relative ~ period + business, na.rm = TRUE)
ms_weights$stratum <- c("TS", "TA", "TS", "TS", "TS")

ms_weights
##   business classification weight level1 level2 stratum
## 1       B1             11    553      1     11      TS
## 2       B2             11    646      1     11      TA
## 3       B3             11    312      1     11      TS
## 4       B4             12    622      1     12      TS
## 5       B5             12    330      1     12      TS

The easiest way to deal with multiple digit-wise classifications is to concatenate them into one classification. In this example the “stratum” dimension comes before the “classification” dimension for the purposes of parental imputation. This classification can be expanded with the expand_classification() function as before, just with an extra instruction to say that the last “digit” in the classification is two characters wide, not one.

classification_sps <- paste0(ms_weights$classification, ms_weights$stratum) |>
  expand_classification(width = c(1, 1, 2))

pias_sps <- aggregation_structure(
  c(classification_sps, ms_weights["business"]),
  ms_weights$weight
)

pias_sps
## Aggregation structure for 5 elemental aggregates with 3 levels above the elemental aggregates 
##   level1 level2 level3 ea weight
## 1      1     11   11TS B1    553
## 2      1     11   11TA B2    646
## 3      1     11   11TS B3    312
## 4      1     12   12TS B4    622
## 5      1     12   12TS B5    330

The elemental indexes can now be aggregated according to this new aggregation structure.

index_sps <- aggregate(elementals, pias_sps, na.rm = TRUE)

index_sps
## Period-over-period price index for 11 levels over 4 time periods 
##      202001    202002    202003   202004
## 1         1 1.3007239 1.0630743 2.684412
## 11        1 1.3007239 1.0630743 1.492443
## 12        1 1.3007239 1.0630743 4.576286
## 11TS      1 1.3007239 1.0630743 0.537996
## 11TA      1 1.3007239 1.0630743 2.770456
## 12TS      1 1.3007239 1.0630743 4.576286
## B1        1 0.8949097 0.3342939 0.537996
## B2        1 1.3007239 1.0630743 2.770456
## B3        1 2.0200036 1.6353355 0.537996
## B4        1 1.3007239 1.0630743 4.576286
## B5        1 1.3007239 1.0630743 4.576286

When a price index has many dimensions (e.g., industry, sampling stratum, region), it can be useful to interact the classifications for these different dimensions to get all possible aggregation structures. The aggregated index can then be re-aggregated to get index values for all dimensions.

Continuing with the example, the industry and strata classifications can be interacted to get two aggregation structures that can be used to re-aggregate index_sps.

interacted_hierarchy <- interact_classifications(
  expand_classification(ms_weights$classification),
  expand_classification(ms_weights$stratum)
)

pias_sps2 <- lapply(
  interacted_hierarchy,
  \(x) aggregation_structure(c(x, ms_weights["business"]), ms_weights$weight)
)

index_sps2 <- lapply(pias_sps2, \(x) aggregate(index_sps, x, include_ea = FALSE))

The resulting indexes can be merged together to give an index that includes all combinations of industry and sampling stratum.

Reduce(merge, index_sps2)
## Period-over-period price index for 8 levels over 4 time periods 
##       202001   202002   202003   202004
## 1:T        1 1.300724 1.063074 2.684412
## 1:TS       1 1.300724 1.063074 2.653820
## 1:TA       1 1.300724 1.063074 2.770456
## 11:T       1 1.300724 1.063074 1.492443
## 12:T       1 1.300724 1.063074 4.576286
## 11:TS      1 1.300724 1.063074 0.537996
## 11:TA      1 1.300724 1.063074 2.770456
## 12:TS      1 1.300724 1.063074 4.576286