Bureau of Labor Statistics

US Jobs Report

Every month, usually on the first Friday, the BLS releases its Employment Situation Summary, commonly known as the "US jobs report," among other monthly, quarterly, annual, etc., reports.

The methods the BLS uses for the surveys that originate the data for the jobs reports, and how the calculations for the reports are done, are publicly available government data, published on the BLS website.

The BLS collects job data in two separate surveys: the Current Population Survey (CPS) and Current Employment Statistics (CES).

Current Population Survey (CPS)

This survey provides data on the employed, unemployed, and those not in the labor force. It measures the unemployment rate, labor force participation rate, and employment-to-population ratio. It is a monthly survey of U.S. households, conducted by the United States Census Bureau for the BLS. Participation in the survey is voluntary.

After the interviews are conducted, the Census Bureau processes the raw data files (as submitted by interviewers) to create a microdata file that can be used to produce estimates. This processing includes removing all personally identifiable information, assigning standardized occupation and industry classifications, editing the data for completeness and consistency, and creating new data elements based on responses to multiple survey questions. Data from field interviewers and centralized call centers are transmitted to Census Bureau headquarters daily during the survey interview period through secure electronic communications. When the Census Bureau's processing activities are completed, the microdata file is securely transferred to the BLS for estimation of labor force statistics.

Current Employment Statistics (CES)

This program produces detailed industry estimates of nonfarm employment, hours, and earnings of workers on payrolls. CES National Estimates (CES-N) produces data for the nation, and CES State and Metro Area (CES-SA) produces estimates for all 50 States, the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico, the Virgin Islands, and about 450 metropolitan areas and divisions.

Both surveys are needed for a complete picture of the labor market, and the estimates differ because the surveys have distinct definitions of employment and distinct survey and estimation methods.

Revisions

The BLS cautions on its releases page that "data in archived news releases may have been revised in subsequent releases. The latest data, including any revisions, may be obtained from the databases accessible on the program homepages."

In addition to the last month's information, the jobs report revises up or down the previous two months' jobs totals. The primary reasons for the monthly revisions are the collection of additional samples and seasonal adjustments. Also, each year, CES March employment data are reanchored or benchmarked to employment population totals primarily derived from the Quarterly Census of Employment and Wages. This is done by replacing the March data-based employment estimates with universe counts of employment. The data are also re-seasonally adjusted to account for the benchmark revision and the re-evaluation of outliers and models. "Although revisions can seem disruptive to some users, they are an integral part of the quality control of CES sample-based estimates." The BLS does not wait until it has all the reports to make the estimate and avoid revisions because users of the data are "intensely interested in the earliest possible read on labor market developments." As the revised estimates are based on more complete data, they create a higher resolution picture; sometimes, the revised data produce a totally different picture.

Following Trump's firing of Commissioner McEntarfer, the media explained how The Employment Situation reports are made, stating that revisions are not unusual, nor are large changes in them abnormal. The BLS considers its initial job numbers as preliminary when they are first published, because some businesses do not report their payroll data by the deadline (only about 60% do), making the report harder to estimate. The BLS continues collecting the payroll data (three months after the deadline, when more than 90% of workplaces have responded), and revising it according to seasonal adjustments; if more complete data is much above or below the preliminary data, "revisions can be exacerbated by the BLS' seasonal adjustments, which sometimes need to be recalculated." The data is revised in each of the two months following the initial report, also in a preliminary annual revision (August), and in a final annual revision (February), adding unemployment insurance data; there is a 10-year revision with census data. The BLS does not provide lengthy analyses of the revisions; according to William Beach, "it's normal for BLS not to explain those differences, because then they're doing a job outside of the job they're supposed to do, which is to take the data, and statistically make modifications to the estimates based on the data."

According to the WSJ, the BLS has faced issues with data collection in recent years. Budget cuts—including a governmental hiring freeze earlier this year—and response rates have made providing real-time, accurate data more difficult. For example, the BLS surveys about 120,000 employers by phone or online to track the number of jobs in the economy and about 30% to 40% do not reply on time—up from under 20% a decade ago.

According to Barry Knapp of Ironsides Macroeconomics, the model used by BLS systematically overestimates the employment effects of small businesses. At the same time, reduced numbers of job-seeking foreigners are not caused by higher employment but by increased deportations and sinking immigration, which is not reflected in the BLS reports.

Commissioners

Commissioners of Labor Statistics (1885 to present):

Table notes:

Statistical reporting

Statistics published by the BLS fall into four main categories:

Prices

• U.S. Consumer Price Index
• Producer Price Index
• U.S. Import and Export Price Indexes
• Consumer Expenditure Survey

Employment and unemployment

• Current Population Survey (The "Household Survey")
  • The American Time Use Survey
• Current Employment Statistics (The "Establishment Survey")
  • Payroll Employment
  • JOLTS report - Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey
  • Economic geography
  • Salary Data
• Local Area Unemployment Statistics (LAUS)
  • List of U.S. states by unemployment rate
• Current Employment Statistics State and Area program
• The Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey (JOLTS)
• The Quarterly Census of Employment and Wages (QCEW)
• The Business Employment Dynamics (BED) program
• Not in labor force (NILF)
• Ten year occupational employment projections
• Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics, called OES until recently
• Mass Layoff Statistics--discontinued in 2013

Compensation and working conditions

• National Compensation Survey
  • Employment Cost Index
• Workplace Injury and Fatality Statistics
• Occupational Requirements Survey

Productivity

• Labor productivity, aggregate and by industry
• Multifactor productivity
• State labor productivity
• Work Stoppage data

Statistical regions

Data produced by the BLS is often categorized into groups of states known as Census Regions. There are four Census Regions, which are further categorized by Census Division as follows:

Northeast Region

• New England Division: Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Rhode Island, and Vermont.
• Middle Atlantic Division: New Jersey, New York, and Pennsylvania.

South Region

• South Atlantic Division: Delaware, District of Columbia, Florida, Georgia, Maryland, North Carolina, South Carolina, Virginia, and West Virginia.
• East South Central Division: Alabama, Kentucky, Mississippi, and Tennessee.
• West South Central Division: Arkansas, Louisiana, Oklahoma, and Texas.

Midwest Region

• East North Central Division: Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, Ohio, and Wisconsin.
• West North Central Division: Iowa, Kansas, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, North Dakota, and South Dakota.

West Region

• Mountain Division: Arizona, Colorado, Idaho, Montana, Nevada, New Mexico, Utah, and Wyoming.
• Pacific Division: Alaska, California, Hawaii, Oregon, and Washington.