Forum Discussion
Calculating a variance
I'm trying calculate a variance and need help please. I'm trying to take submissions from Year 2018 subtract submissions from 2017, then divide that number by submissions from 2017. My problem is with keeping the submission with the state and product. I think I need a FILTER(), but not sure how that would work.
The SQL would look like:
SELECT (a.Submission - b.Submission) / b.Submission
FROM dbo.Table a
JOIN dbo.Table b ON a.StateCode = b.StateCode
AND a.ShortProductDesc = b.ShortProductDesc
AND a.SubmissionYearMonth = b.PriorYearsSubmissionYearMonth
15 Replies
Hi cpunnett,
You can try creating a measure in DAX using the following formula
VARIANCE = VAR SUBMISSIONS_ = SUM ( 'Table'[Submission Column] ) VAR SUBS2017_ = CALCULATE ( SUBMISSIONS_, 'Table'[Year Column] = 2017 ) VAR SUBS2018_ = CALCULATE ( SUBMISSIONS_, 'Table'[Year Column] = 2018 ) RETURN DIVIDE ( SUBS2018_ - SUBS2017_, SUBS2017_ )That helps me understand how it would work, I appreciate that. But I can't seem to get mine to work. All I get are zeroes. When I return either variable I get the same numbers as the sums. I not sure what I'm not doing correctly yet.
Can anyone tell me why I'm seeing the error "The expression refers to muliple columns. Multiple columns cannot be converted to a scalar value." From this DAX?
Issue Variance = VAR Issued = SUM('Activity Counts6'[Issued]) VAR SUBS2017 = CALCULATE('Activity Counts6', 'Activity Counts6'[Year] = 2017) VAR SUBS2018 = CALCULATE('Activity Counts6', 'Activity Counts6'[Year] = 2018) RETURN DIVIDE (SUBS2018 - SUBS2017, SUBS2017)
