Explanatory Notes and Estimates of Error - United States Bureau of Labor Statistics report - Statistical Data Included

Employment and Earnings, June, 1999

Employment covered by State unemployment insurance programs. Most nonfarm wage and salary workers are covered by the unemployment insurance programs. However, some employees, such as those working in parochial schools and churches, are not covered by unemployment insurance, whereas they are included in the BLS establishment statistics.

Household Data ("A" tables, monthly; "Data" tables, quarterly)

COLLECTION AND COVERAGE

Statistics on the employment status of the population and related data are compiled by BLS using data from the Current Population Survey (CPS). This monthly survey of households is conducted for BLS by the Bureau of the Census through a scientifically selected sample designed to represent the civilian noninstitutional population. Respondents are interviewed to obtain information about the employment status of each member of the household 16 years of age and over. The inquiry relates to activity or status during the calendar week, Sunday through Saturday, which includes the 12th day of the month. This is known as the "reference week." Actual field interviewing is conducted in the following week, referred to as the "survey week."

Each month about 50,000 occupied units are eligible for interview. Some 3,200 of these households are contacted but interviews are not obtained because the occupants are not at home after repeated calls or are unavailable for other reasons. This represents a noninterview rate for the survey that ranges between 6 and 7 percent. In addition to the 50,000 occupied units, there are about 9,000 sample units in an average month which are visited but found to be vacant or otherwise not eligible for enumeration. Part of the sample is changed each month. The rotation plan, as will be explained later, provides for three-fourths of the sample to be common from one month to the next, and one-half to be common with the same month a year earlier.

CONCEPTS AND DEFINITIONS

The concepts and definitions underlying labor force data have been modified, but not substantially altered, since the inception of the survey in 1940; those in use as of January 1994 are as follows:

Civilian noninstitutional population. Included are persons 16 years of age and older residing in the 50 States and the District of Columbia who are not inmates of institutions (e.g., penal and mental facilities, homes for the aged), and who are not on active duty in the Armed Forces.

Employed persons. All persons who, during the reference week, (a) did any work at all (at least 1 hour) as paid employees, worked in their own business, profession, or on their own farm, or who worked 15 hours or more as unpaid workers in an enterprise operated by a member of the family, and (b) all those who were not working but who had jobs or businesses from which they were temporarily absent because of vacation, illness, bad weather, child-care problems, maternity or paternity leave, labor-management dispute, job training, or other family or personal reasons, whether or not they were paid for the time off or were seeking other jobs.