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Chapter 1.
Labor Force Data Derived from the Current Population
Survey
Each month, the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) analyzes
and publishes statistics on the labor force, employment, and
unemployment, classified by a variety of demographic, social,
and economic characteristics.
These statistics are derived from the Current
Population Survey (CPS), which is conducted by the Census Bureau
for BLS. This monthly survey of the population uses a sample of
households that is designed to represent the civilian
noninstitutional population of the United States.
Background
Specific concepts of the labor force, employment, and
unemployment were developed in the later stages of the
Depression of the 1930s. Before the 1930s, aside from
attempts in some of the decennial censuses, no direct
measurements were made of the number of jobless persons.
Mass unemployment in the early 1930s increased the need
for statistics, and widely conflicting estimates based
on a variety of indirect techniques began to appear.
Dissatisfied with these methods, many research groups,
as well as State and municipal governments, began
experimenting with direct surveys or samples of the
population. In these surveys, an attempt was made to
classify the population as employed, unemployed, or
out of the labor force by means of a series of questions
addressed to each individual. In most of the surveys,
the employed were defined as persons with occupations
(“gainful workers”), and the unemployed were defined as
those who were not working but were “willing and able to
work.” These concepts did not meet the standards of
objectivity that many technicians felt were necessary
to measure either the level of unemployment at a point
in time or changes over time. Counts of gainful workers
did not have a current dimension, and the criterion
“willing and able to work,” when applied in specific
situations, appeared to be too intangible and too dependent
upon the interpretation and attitude of the persons being
interviewed.
A set of precise concepts was developed in the late 1930s
to address these various criticisms. The classification of an
individual depended principally upon his or her actual activity
within a designated period, that is, was the individual working,
looking for work, or engaged in other activities? These concepts
were adopted for the national sample survey of households,
called the Monthly Report of Unemployment, initiated in 1940
by the Works Progress Administration.
The household survey was transferred to the Census Bureau in
late 1942, and its name was changed to the Monthly Report on the
Labor Force. The name was changed once more, in 1948, to the
present Current Population Survey in order to reflect the
survey’s expanding role as a source for data on a wide variety
of demographic, social, and economic characteristics of the
population. In 1959, responsibility for analyzing and publishing
the CPS labor force data was transferred to BLS; the Census
Bureau continues to collect the data.
Next: Description of
the Survey
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Bureau of Labor Statistics
