Chapter 2.
Employment, Hours, and Earnings from the Establishment Survey

Data Presentation
National employment estimates are published for all NAICS three-digit and higher level aggregate industries, 92 percent of the four-digit industries, 86 percent of the five-digit industries, and 44 percent of the six-digit industries.

The CES program currently publishes more than 5,200 national series each month. Tables 2, 3, and 4 in this chapter summarize the published national detail by industry supersector. Table 2 describes the primary series produced by the program, that is, those computed directly from the sample data. Table 3 indicates the special series derived from the primary series, and Table 4 lists the seasonally adjusted series.

The national series on employment, hours, and earnings appear in several BLS publications. The summary data are first published each month in The Employment Situation news release, which contains preliminary national estimates of nonfarm employment, average weekly hours, and average hourly and weekly earnings in the preceding month for industry supersectors. Preliminary estimates are based on tabulations of data for less than the full sample (about 57 percent) to permit early release of these widely used economic indicators. This release is normally issued on Friday, 3 weeks after the reference week. The news release also includes a brief analysis of current trends in employment, hours, and earnings.

Most of the national estimates at the level of detail described in tables 2, 3, and 4 are published monthly on the Internet on the morning of the release. Estimates also are published in Employment and Earnings. The summary data are in the issue available about 5 weeks after the week of reference; preliminary estimates for the full industry detail, based on about 74 percent of the sample, are in the following month’s issue. Final (prebenchmarked) figures are issued 1 month later. Special articles describe technical developments in the program. The Monthly Labor Review also presents many of the national series as well as articles exploring industry employment trends.

Detailed employment, hours, and earnings data also are available on the Internet. The data can be accessed directly at http://data.bls.gov/labjava/outside.jsp?survey=ce or through the CES homepage, which provides extensive documentation on the program. National data also are disseminated in the publications or online databases of other Federal agencies, such as the U.S. Department of Commerce, the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System, and the Council of Economic Advisers. Data also are regularly republished in summary form or for specific industries in many trade association journals, the labor press, and in general reference works.

In addition to the national estimates, BLS publishes in Employment and Earnings monthly employment estimates for all 50 States, the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico, the Virgin Islands, and 288 metropolitan areas.¹ These estimates were adjusted to March 2003 benchmarks with the publication of January 2004 data. The employment series cover total nonfarm employment and industry supersectors (for example, construction and manufacturing) for each State and area. Hours and earnings data generally are limited to manufacturing production workers. Detailed industry data also are available monthly in releases published by the State Employment Security Agencies that cooperate with BLS in collecting the State and area information. State and area data also are available from the State and Area Current Employment Statistics homepage, which contains extensive information related to the CES State and area program, including contacts, news releases, and data.

Footnotes
¹Data for Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands are not used in compiling national estimates. CES data at the national and State and area levels can be found on the Internet at http://bls.gov/ces/ and http://www.bls.gov/sae/, respectively.

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