Bureau of Labor Statistics

Bureau of Labor Statistics

The Postal Square Building in Washington, D.C., headquarters of the Bureau of Labor Statistics until 2024
Agency overview
Formed	June 27, 1884; 141 years ago (1884-06-27)
Jurisdiction	Federal government of the United States
Headquarters	Suitland Federal Center Suitland, Maryland, U.S.
Employees	2,100[1]
Annual budget	$655 million (2021)[2]
Agency executive	William J. Wiatrowski, Acting Commissioner[3] and Deputy Commissioner[4]
Website	bls.gov

The Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) is a unit of the United States Department of Labor. It is the principal fact-finding agency for the U.S. government in the broad field of labor economics and statistics and serves as a principal agency of the U.S. Federal Statistical System. The BLS collects, processes, analyzes, and disseminates essential statistical data to the American public, the U.S. Congress, other Federal agencies, State and local governments, business, and labor representatives. The BLS also serves as a statistical resource to the United States Department of Labor, and conducts research measuring the income levels families need to maintain a satisfactory quality of life.^[5]

BLS data must satisfy a number of criteria, including relevance to current social and economic issues, timeliness in reflecting today's rapidly changing economic conditions, accuracy and consistently high statistical quality, impartiality in both subject matter and presentation, and accessibility to all. To avoid the appearance of partiality, the dates of major data releases are scheduled more than a year in advance, in coordination with the Office of Management and Budget.^[6]

The Bureau of Labor was established within the Department of the Interior on June 27, 1884, to collect information about employment and labor. Its creation under the Bureau of Labor Act (23 Stat. 60) stemmed from the findings of U.S. Senator Henry W. Blair's "Labor and Capital Hearings", which examined labor issues and working conditions in the U.S.^[7] Statistician Carroll D. Wright became the first U.S. Commissioner of Labor in 1885, a position he held until 1905. The Bureau's placement within the federal government structure changed three times in the first 29 years following its formation. It was made an independent (sub-Cabinet) department by the Department of Labor Act (25 Stat. 182) on June 13, 1888. The Bureau was then incorporated into the Department of Commerce and Labor by the Department of Commerce Act (32 Stat. 827) on February 14, 1903. Finally, it was transferred under the Department of Labor in 1913, where it resides today.^[8][9] Starting in 1992, BLS was headquartered in the Postal Square Building near Washington Union Station. During 2024, BLS headquarters were moved to the Suitland Federal Center in Suitland, Maryland, into the same facility that houses the Bureau of the Census headquarters.

Since 1915, the BLS has published the Monthly Labor Review, a journal focused on the data and methodologies of labor statistics.

The BLS is headed by a commissioner who serves a four-year term from the date he or she takes office. The most recent Commissioner of Labor Statistics is Erika McEntarfer, who was confirmed by the U.S. Senate for the office on January 11, 2024.^[10]

Erica Groshen was confirmed by the U.S. Senate on January 2, 2013, and sworn in as the 14th Commissioner of Labor Statistics on January 29, 2013, for a term that ended on January 27, 2017.^[11][12] William Wiatrowski, Deputy Commissioner of the BLS, served as Acting Commissioner until the next commissioner, William Beach was sworn in. Beach served until January 2024, at which time he was succeeded by Erika McEntarfer.

On August 1, 2025, President Donald Trump announced he would fire Commissioner McEntarfer, hours after a downward revision in job creation was published in the Bureau's July jobs report.^[13][14] According to the BBC, "[t]he decision shocked Wall Street and raised alarm about White House interference in economic data."^[15] Commentators pointed out that due to BLS security precautions, the commissioner did not have access to the systems that collect the data for this report, and could not change the results without a large number of people knowing and at least some of them complaining publicly.^[16]

Every month, usually on the first Friday, the BLS releases its Employment Situation Summary, commonly known as the "US jobs report,"^[17] among other monthly, quarterly, annual, etc., reports.^[18]

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.^[19]

The BLS collects job data in two separate surveys:

• 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-population ratio.^[20] It is a monthly survey of U.S. households,^[21][22] conducted by the United States Census Bureau for the BLS.^[23] Participation in the survey is voluntary. ^[24]

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.^[25]

• 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. Each month, CES surveys approximately 121,000 businesses and government agencies, representing approximately 631,000 individual worksites, drawn from a sampling frame of unemployment insurance tax accounts. Both programs use the same sample and collection methods.^[26][27] Participation in the survey is voluntary under federal law, but it is mandatory in California, New Mexico, Ohio, Oregon, South Carolina, and Puerto Rico. The South Carolina requirement applies to firms with more than 20 employees. The businesses report data on employment, hours, and earnings for all paid workers from their payroll records. The data is collected for the pay period that includes the 12th of the month (no matter what its length), via a form sent to workplaces, by telephone, and online (not by email, for security reasons).^[28]

For its monthly estimation, the CES-N program uses a matched sample concept and weighted sample data to produce employment, hours, and earnings estimates. Regarding its reliability, the CES survey, like other sample surveys, is subject to two types of error: sampling and nonsampling error. The magnitude of sampling error, or variance, is directly related to the size of the sample and the percentage of universe coverage achieved by the sample. The CES sample covers over one-third of total universe employment, yielding a very small variance for the total nonfarm estimates. Nonsampling error includes response errors, nonresponse bias, and frame imperfections, such as the inability to account for business births.^[29][30]

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.^[31] The BLS considers its initial job numbers as preliminary when they are first published, because some businesses don't 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, more than a 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."^[31] 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 doesn't give lengthy analysis of the revisions; according to William Beach ,^{[31]: min.02:13} "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."^[32][31][33]

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% don’t reply on time—up from under 20% a decade ago.^[34]

Commissioners of Labor Statistics (1885 to present):^[35]

No.	Portrait	Commissioner	Took office	Left office	Refs.
1		Carroll D. Wright	January 1885	January 1905
2		Charles P. Neill	February 1905	May 1913
Acting		George Hanger	May 1913	August 1913
3		Royal Meeker	August 11, 1913	June 1920
4		Ethelbert Stewart	June 1920	June 1932
Acting		Charles E. Baldwin	July 1932	July 1933
5		Isador Lubin	July 1933	January 1946
Acting		A. Ford Hinrichs	January 1946	July 1946
Acting		Aryness Joy Wickens	July 1946	August 1946
6		Ewan Clague	August 1946	September 1965
7		Arthur Ross	October 1965	July 1968
Acting		Ben Burdetsky	July 1968	March 1969
8		Geoffrey H. Moore	March 1969	January 1973	[36]
Acting		Ben Burdetsky	January 1973	July 1973
9		Julius Shiskin[a]	July 1973	October 1978	[37]
10		Janet L. Norwood	May 1979	December 1991	[38]
Acting		William G. Barron Jr.	December 1991	October 1993
11		Katharine Abraham	October 1993	October 2001	[39]
Acting		Lois Orr	October 2001	July 2002
12		Kathleen Utgoff	July 2002	July 2006	[40]
Acting		Philip Rones	July 2006	January 2008
13		Keith Hall	January 2008	January 2012	[41]
Acting		John M. (Jack) Galvin	January 2012	January 2013
14		Erica Groshen	January 29, 2013	January 27, 2017	[42]
Acting		William J. Wiatrowski	January 2017	March 2019
15		William Beach	March 28, 2019	March 27, 2023	[43][44]
Acting		William J. Wiatrowski	March 28, 2023	January 28, 2024
16		Erika McEntarfer	January 29, 2024	August 1, 2025	[45][3]
Acting		William J. Wiatrowski	August 1, 2025	Present

Table notes:

Statistics published by the BLS fall into four main categories:^[46]

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

• Current Population Survey (The "Household Survey")
  • The American Time Use Survey^[47]
• Current Employment Statistics^[48] (The "Establishment Survey")
  • Payroll Employment
  • JOLTS report - Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey
  • Economic geography
  • Salary Data
• Local Area Unemployment Statistics (LAUS)^[49]
  • List of U.S. states by unemployment rate
• Current Employment Statistics State and Area program^[50]
• The Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey (JOLTS)^[51]
• The Quarterly Census of Employment and Wages (QCEW)^[52]
• The Business Employment Dynamics (BED) program^[53]
• Ten year occupational employment projections
• Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics, called OES until recently
• Mass Layoff Statistics--discontinued in 2013^[54]

• National Compensation Survey
  • Employment Cost Index
• Workplace Injury and Fatality Statistics^[55]

  

• Occupational Requirements Survey

• Labor productivity, aggregate and by industry^[56]
• Multifactor productivity
• State labor productivity
• Work Stoppage data

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.

• Alternative employment arrangements
• Bureau of Economic Analysis
• Career Guide to Industries
• Data.gov
• Economic reports
• Index of Leading Indicators
• Job Creation Index
• Monthly Labor Review
• National Income and Product Accounts
• Occupational Outlook Handbook
• U.S. Census Bureau
• USAFacts

• Joseph P. Goldberg and William T. Moye, The First 100 Years of the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Bulletin No. 2235. Washington, D.C.: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1985.
• William J. Wiatrowski, "BLS at 125: Using historic principles to track the 21st-century economy". Monthly Labor Review, June 2009, pp. 3–25.

• Official website
• Records of the Bureau of Labor Statistics in the National Archives (Record Group 257)
• Bureau of Labor Statistics in the Federal Register
• Publications of the BLS available on FRASER
• Bulletins of the United States Bureau of Labor Statistics, dating back to 1895
• Local Area Unemployment Reports