The seasonally-adjusted SGS Alternate Unemployment Rate reflects current unemployment reporting methodology adjusted for SGS-estimated long-term discouraged workers, who were defined out of official existence in 1994. That estimate is added to the BLS estimate of U-6 unemployment, which includes short-term discouraged workers.

The U-3 unemployment rate is the monthly headline number. The U-6 unemployment rate is the Bureau of Labor Statistics’ (BLS) broadest unemployment measure, including short-term discouraged and other marginally-attached workers as well as those forced to work part-time because they cannot find full-time employment.

Transmission of material in this release is embargoed until                   USDL-13-2315
8:30 a.m. (EST) Friday, December 6, 2013

Technical information:
 Household data:     (202) 691-6378  •  cpsinfo@bls.gov  •  www.bls.gov/cps
 Establishment data: (202) 691-6555  •  cesinfo@bls.gov  •  www.bls.gov/ces

Media contact:  (202) 691-5902  •  PressOffice@bls.gov

                        THE EMPLOYMENT SITUATION -- NOVEMBER 2013

The unemployment rate declined from 7.3 percent to 7.0 percent in November, and total
nonfarm payroll employment rose by 203,000, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics
reported today. Employment increased in transportation and warehousing, health care,
and manufacturing.

Household Survey Data

Both the number of unemployed persons, at 10.9 million, and the unemployment rate, at
7.0 percent, declined in November. Among the unemployed, the number who reported being
on temporary layoff decreased by 377,000. This largely reflects the return to work of
federal employees who were furloughed in October due to the partial government shutdown.
(See tables A-1 and A-11.)

Among the major worker groups, the unemployment rates for adult men (6.7 percent),
adult women (6.2 percent), teenagers (20.8 percent), whites (6.2 percent), blacks
(12.5 percent), and Hispanics (8.7 percent) changed little in November. The jobless
rate for Asians was 5.3 percent (not seasonally adjusted), little changed from a year
earlier. (See tables A-1, A-2, and A-3.)

The number of persons unemployed less than 5 weeks declined by 300,000 in November,
partially reflecting the return to work of federal employees on furlough in October.
The number of long-term unemployed (those jobless for 27 weeks or more) was essentially
unchanged at 4.1 million in November. These individuals accounted for 37.3 percent of
the unemployed. The number of long-term unemployed has declined by 718,000 over the
past 12 months. (See table A-12.)

The civilian labor force rose by 455,000 in November, after declining by 720,000 in
October. The labor force participation rate changed little (63.0 percent) in November.
Total employment as measured by the household survey increased by 818,000 over the
month, following a decline of 735,000 in the prior month. This over-the-month increase
in employment partly reflected the return to work of furloughed federal government
employees. The employment-population ratio increased by 0.3 percentage point to 58.6
percent in November, reversing a decline of the same size in the prior month. (See
table A-1.)

The number of persons employed part time for economic reasons (sometimes referred to
as involuntary part-time workers) fell by 331,000 to 7.7 million in November. These
individuals were working part time because their hours had been cut back or because
they were unable to find a full-time job. (See table A-8.)

In November, 2.1 million persons were marginally attached to the labor force, down by
409,000 from a year earlier. (The data are not seasonally adjusted.) These individuals
were not in the labor force, wanted and were available for work, and had looked for a
job sometime in the prior 12 months. They were not counted as unemployed because they
had not searched for work in the 4 weeks preceding the survey. (See table A-16.)

Among the marginally attached, there were 762,000 discouraged workers in November, down
by 217,000 from a year ago. (The data are not seasonally adjusted.) Discouraged workers
are persons not currently looking for work because they believe no jobs are available
for them. The remaining 1.3 million persons marginally attached to the labor  force in
November had not searched for work for reasons such as school attendance or family
responsibilities. (See table A-16.)

Establishment Survey Data

Total nonfarm payroll employment increased by 203,000 in November. Job growth averaged
195,000 per month over the prior 12 months. In November, job gains occurred in
transportation and warehousing, health care, and manufacturing. (See table B-1.)

Employment in transportation and warehousing rose by 31,000 in November, with gains
in couriers and messengers (+9,000), truck transportation (+8,000), warehousing and
storage (+5,000), and air transportation (+3,000).

Health care employment continued to increase over the month (+28,000). Job gains occurred
in home healthcare services (+12,000) and offices of physicians (+7,000), while nursing
care facilities lost jobs (-4,000). Job growth in health care has averaged 19,000 per
month thus far this year, compared with an average monthly gain of 27,000 in 2012.

In November, manufacturing added 27,000 jobs. Within the industry, job gains occurred in
food manufacturing (+8,000) and in motor vehicles and parts (+7,000).

In November, employment in professional and business services continued to trend up
(+35,000). Over the prior 12 months, the industry added an average of 55,000 jobs per
month.

Retail trade employment also continued to expand in November (+22,000). Within the
industry, job growth occurred in general merchandise stores (+14,000); in sporting
goods, hobby, book, and music stores (+12,000); and in automobile dealers (+7,000).
Over the prior 12 months, job growth in retail trade averaged 31,000 per month.

Within leisure and hospitality, employment in food services and drinking places continued
to trend up in November (+18,000). Job growth in this industry averaged 28,000 per month
over the prior 12 months.

Employment in construction continued to trend up in November (+17,000). Monthly job
gains in the industry averaged 15,000 over the prior 12 months.

Federal government employment continued to decline (-7,000) in November. Over the past
12 months, federal government employment has decreased by 92,000.

Employment in other major industries, including mining and logging, wholesale trade,
information, and financial activities, showed little or no change in November.

The average workweek for all employees on private nonfarm payrolls edged up by
0.1 hour to 34.5 hours in November. The manufacturing workweek edged up by 0.1 hour
to 41.0 hours, and factory overtime edged up by 0.1 hour to 3.5 hours. The average
workweek for production and nonsupervisory employees on private nonfarm payrolls
edged up by 0.1 hour to 33.7 hours. (See tables B-2 and B-7.)

In November, average hourly earnings for all employees on private nonfarm payrolls rose
by 4 cents to $24.15. Over the year, average hourly earnings have risen by 48 cents,
or 2.0 percent. In November, average hourly earnings of production and nonsupervisory
employees increased by 3 cents to $20.31. (See tables B-3 and B-8.)

The change in total nonfarm payroll employment for September was revised from +163,000
to +175,000, and the change for October was revised from +204,000 to +200,000. With
these revisions, employment gains in September and October combined were 8,000 higher
than previously reported.

_____________
The Employment Situation for December is scheduled to be released on Friday,
January 10, 2014, at 8:30 a.m. (EST).

   ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
  |                                                                                       |
  |                           Household Survey Reference Period                           |
  |                                                                                       |
  |In the household survey, the reference period for November 2013 was the calendar week  |
  |that included the 5th of the month. Typically, the reference period for the household  |
  |survey is the calendar week that includes the 12th of the month. The November reference|
  |week was moved up in 2013 due to the timing of the November and December holidays. In  |
  |accordance with usual practice, this change is made in November when necessary to allow|
  |for sufficient time to process data and conduct survey operations.                     |
  |                                                                                       |
   ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

  ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
 |                                                                                        |
 |               Revision of Seasonally Adjusted Household Survey Data                    |
 |                                                                                        |
 |In accordance with usual practice, The Employment Situation release for December 2013,  |
 |scheduled for January 10, 2014, will incorporate annual revisions in seasonally adjusted|
 |unemployment and other labor force series from the household survey. Seasonally adjusted|
 |data for the most recent 5 years are subject to revision.                               |
 |                                                                                        |
   ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

  ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
  |                                                                                      |
  |                  Upcoming Change to the Household Survey Tables                      |
  |                                                                                      |
  |Effective with the release of January 2014 data on February 7, 2014, household survey |
  |table A-10 will include two new seasonally adjusted series for women age 55 and over— |
  |the number of unemployed persons and the unemployment rate. These will replace the    |
  |series that are currently displayed for this group, which are not seasonally adjusted.|
  |                                                                                      |
   --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

HOUSEHOLD DATA
Summary table A. Household data, seasonally adjusted

[Numbers in thousands]

Category	Nov. 2012	Sept. 2013	Oct. 2013	Nov. 2013	Change from: Oct. 2013- Nov. 2013
Employment status
Civilian noninstitutional population	244,174	246,168	246,381	246,567	186
Civilian labor force	155,319	155,559	154,839	155,294	455
Participation rate	63.6	63.2	62.8	63.0	0.2
Employed	143,277	144,303	143,568	144,386	818
Employment-population ratio	58.7	58.6	58.3	58.6	0.3
Unemployed	12,042	11,255	11,272	10,907	-365
Unemployment rate	7.8	7.2	7.3	7.0	-0.3
Not in labor force	88,855	90,609	91,541	91,273	-268
Unemployment rates
Total, 16 years and over	7.8	7.2	7.3	7.0	-0.3
Adult men (20 years and over)	7.2	7.1	7.0	6.7	-0.3
Adult women (20 years and over)	7.0	6.2	6.4	6.2	-0.2
Teenagers (16 to 19 years)	23.6	21.4	22.2	20.8	-1.4
White	6.8	6.3	6.3	6.2	-0.1
Black or African American	13.2	12.9	13.1	12.5	-0.6
Asian (not seasonally adjusted)	6.4	5.3	5.2	5.3	–
Hispanic or Latino ethnicity	9.9	9.0	9.1	8.7	-0.4
Total, 25 years and over	6.5	6.0	6.1	5.9	-0.2
Less than a high school diploma	12.1	10.3	10.9	10.8	-0.1
High school graduates, no college	8.1	7.6	7.3	7.3	0.0
Some college or associate degree	6.6	6.0	6.3	6.4	0.1
Bachelor’s degree and higher	3.9	3.7	3.8	3.4	-0.4
Reason for unemployment
Job losers and persons who completed temporary jobs	6,429	5,844	6,253	5,804	-449
Job leavers	926	989	861	893	32
Reentrants	3,325	3,181	3,117	3,073	-44
New entrants	1,326	1,222	1,223	1,165	-58
Duration of unemployment
Less than 5 weeks	2,596	2,596	2,761	2,461	-300
5 to 14 weeks	2,757	2,703	2,656	2,597	-59
15 to 26 weeks	1,820	1,804	1,782	1,766	-16
27 weeks and over	4,784	4,146	4,063	4,066	3
Employed persons at work part time
Part time for economic reasons	8,138	7,926	8,050	7,719	-331
Slack work or business conditions	5,084	4,960	5,047	4,869	-178
Could only find part-time work	2,648	2,557	2,599	2,486	-113
Part time for noneconomic reasons	18,594	18,967	18,786	18,876	90
Persons not in the labor force (not seasonally adjusted)
Marginally attached to the labor force	2,505	2,302	2,283	2,096	–
Discouraged workers	979	852	815	762	–
– Over-the-month changes are not displayed for not seasonally adjusted data. NOTE: Persons whose ethnicity is identified as Hispanic or Latino may be of any race. Detail for the seasonally adjusted data shown in this table will not necessarily add to totals because of the independent seasonal adjustment of the various series. Updated population controls are introduced annually with the release of January data.

ESTABLISHMENT DATA
Summary table B. Establishment data, seasonally adjusted

Category	Nov. 2012	Sept. 2013	Oct. 2013(p)	Nov. 2013(p)
EMPLOYMENT BY SELECTED INDUSTRY (Over-the-month change, in thousands)
Total nonfarm	247	175	200	203
Total private	256	168	214	196
Goods-producing	43	29	31	44
Mining and logging	12	4	3	0
Construction	24	17	12	17
Manufacturing	7	8	16	27
Durable goods(1)	17	12	11	17
Motor vehicles and parts	9.7	2.5	4.1	6.7
Nondurable goods	-10	-4	5	10
Private service-providing(1)	213	139	183	152
Wholesale trade	9.8	15.7	-8.1	6.8
Retail trade	69.6	23.3	45.8	22.3
Transportation and warehousing	20.2	36.9	3.1	30.5
Information	14	2	4	-1
Financial activities	5	-3	7	-3
Professional and business services(1)	55	47	48	35
Temporary help services	26.5	27.4	9.1	16.4
Education and health services(1)	14	14	30	40
Health care and social assistance	30.2	19.7	21.3	29.6
Leisure and hospitality	21	-1	49	17
Other services	7	4	4	4
Government	-9	7	-14	7
WOMEN AND PRODUCTION AND NONSUPERVISORY EMPLOYEES(2) AS A PERCENT OF ALL EMPLOYEES
Total nonfarm women employees	49.4	49.4	49.4	49.4
Total private women employees	47.9	47.9	47.9	47.9
Total private production and nonsupervisory employees	82.6	82.6	82.6	82.6
HOURS AND EARNINGS ALL EMPLOYEES
Total private
Average weekly hours	34.4	34.4	34.4	34.5
Average hourly earnings	$23.67	$24.09	$24.11	$24.15
Average weekly earnings	$814.25	$828.70	$829.38	$833.18
Index of aggregate weekly hours (2007=100)(3)	97.0	98.7	98.8	99.3
Over-the-month percent change	0.5	-0.1	0.1	0.5
Index of aggregate weekly payrolls (2007=100)(4)	109.5	113.3	113.6	114.4
Over-the-month percent change	0.9	0.0	0.3	0.7
HOURS AND EARNINGS PRODUCTION AND NONSUPERVISORY EMPLOYEES
Total private
Average weekly hours	33.7	33.7	33.6	33.7
Average hourly earnings	$19.88	$20.25	$20.28	$20.31
Average weekly earnings	$669.96	$682.43	$681.41	$684.45
Index of aggregate weekly hours (2002=100)(3)	104.7	106.3	106.2	106.7
Over-the-month percent change	0.5	0.1	-0.1	0.5
Index of aggregate weekly payrolls (2002=100)(4)	138.9	143.8	143.9	144.8
Over-the-month percent change	0.7	0.3	0.1	0.6
DIFFUSION INDEX(5) (Over 1-month span)
Total private (266 industries)	63.9	61.3	61.1	63.5
Manufacturing (81 industries)	52.5	54.3	56.8	63.0
Footnotes (1) Includes other industries, not shown separately. (2) Data relate to production employees in mining and logging and manufacturing, construction employees in construction, and nonsupervisory employees in the service-providing industries. (3) The indexes of aggregate weekly hours are calculated by dividing the current month’s estimates of aggregate hours by the corresponding annual average aggregate hours. (4) The indexes of aggregate weekly payrolls are calculated by dividing the current month’s estimates of aggregate weekly payrolls by the corresponding annual average aggregate weekly payrolls. (5) Figures are the percent of industries with employment increasing plus one-half of the industries with unchanged employment, where 50 percent indicates an equal balance between industries with increasing and decreasing employment. (p) Preliminary

Frequently Asked Questions about Employment and Unemployment Estimates

1. Why are there two monthly measures of employment?

   The household survey and establishment survey both produce sample-based estimates
   of   employment, and both have strengths and limitations. The establishment survey
   employment series has a   smaller margin of error on the measurement of month-to-
   month change   than the household survey because of its much larger sample size. An
   over-the-month employment change of about 100,000 is statistically significant in
   the establishment survey, while the threshold for a statistically significant change
   in the household survey is about 400,000. However, the household survey has a more
   expansive scope than the establishment survey because it includes self-employed
   workers whose businesses are unincorporated, unpaid family workers, agricultural
   workers, and private household workers, who are excluded by the establishment survey.
   The household survey also provides estimates of employment for demographic groups.
   For more information on the differences between the two surveys, please visit
   www.bls.gov/web/empsit/ces_cps_trends.pdf.

2. Are undocumented immigrants counted in the surveys?

   It is likely that both surveys include at least some undocumented immigrants. However,
   neither the establishment nor the household survey is designed to identify the legal
   status of workers. Therefore, it is not possible to determine how many are counted in
   either survey. The establishment survey does not collect data on the legal status of
   workers. The household survey does include questions which identify the foreign and
   native born, but it does not include questions about the legal status of the foreign
   born. Data on the foreign and native born are published each month in table A-7 of
   The Employment Situation news release.

3. Why does the establishment survey have revisions?

   The establishment survey revises published estimates to improve its data series by
   incorporating additional information that was not available at the time of the
   initial publication of the estimates. The establishment survey revises its initial
   monthly estimates twice, in the immediately succeeding 2 months, to incorporate
   additional sample receipts from respondents in the survey and recalculated seasonal
   adjustment factors. For more information on the monthly revisions, please visit
   www.bls.gov/ces/cesrevinfo.htm.

   On an annual basis, the establishment survey incorporates a benchmark revision that
   re-anchors estimates to nearly complete employment counts available from unemployment
   insurance tax records. The benchmark helps to control for sampling and modeling errors
   in the estimates. For more information on the annual benchmark revision, please visit
   www.bls.gov/web/empsit/cesbmart.htm.

4. Does the establishment survey sample include small firms?

   Yes; about 40 percent of the establishment survey sample is comprised of business
   establishments with fewer than 20 employees. The establishment survey sample is
   designed to maximize the reliability of the statewide total nonfarm employment
   estimate; firms from all states, size classes, and industries are appropriately
   sampled to achieve that goal.

5. Does the establishment survey account for employment from new businesses?

   Yes; monthly establishment survey estimates include an adjustment to account for
   the net employment change generated by business births and deaths. The adjustment
   comes from an econometric model that forecasts the monthly net jobs impact of
   business births and deaths based on the actual past values of the net impact that
   can be observed with a lag from the Quarterly Census of Employment and Wages. The
   establishment survey uses modeling rather than sampling for this purpose because
   the survey is not immediately able to bring new businesses into the sample. There
   is an unavoidable lag between the birth of a new firm and its appearance on the
   sampling frame and availability for selection. BLS adds new businesses to the survey
   twice a year.

6. Is the count of unemployed persons limited to just those people receiving unemployment
   insurance benefits?

   No; the estimate of unemployment is based on a monthly sample survey of households.
   All persons who are without jobs and are actively seeking and available to work are
   included among the unemployed. (People on temporary layoff are included even if
   they do not actively seek work.) There is no requirement or question relating to
   unemployment insurance benefits in the monthly survey.

7. Does the official unemployment rate exclude people who want a job but are not currently
   looking for work?

   Yes; however, there are separate estimates of persons outside the labor force who
   want a job, including those who are not currently looking because they believe no
   jobs are available (discouraged workers). In addition, alternative measures of labor
   underutilization (some of which include discouraged workers and other groups not
   officially counted as unemployed) are published each month in table A-15 of The
   Employment Situation news release. For more information about these alternative
   measures, please visit www.bls.gov/cps/lfcharacteristics.htm#altmeasures.

8. How can unusually severe weather affect employment and hours estimates?

   In the establishment survey, the reference period is the pay period that includes
   the 12th of the month. Unusually severe weather is more likely to have an impact on
   average weekly hours than on employment. Average weekly hours are estimated for paid
   time during the pay period, including pay for holidays, sick leave, or other time off.
   The impact of severe weather on hours estimates typically, but not always, results in
   a reduction in average weekly hours. For example, some employees may be off work for
   part of the pay period and not receive pay for the time missed, while some workers,
   such as those dealing with cleanup or repair, may work extra hours.

   In order for severe weather conditions to reduce the estimate of payroll employment,
   employees have to be off work without pay for the entire pay period. Slightly more
   than 20 percent of all employees in the payroll survey sample have a weekly pay
   period. Employees who receive pay for any part of the pay period, even 1 hour, are
   counted in the payroll employment figures. It is not possible to quantify the effect
   of extreme weather on estimates of over-the-month change in employment.

   In the household survey, the reference period is generally the calendar week that
   includes the 12th of the month. Persons who miss the entire week's work for weather-
   related events are counted as employed whether or not they are paid for the time
   off. The household survey collects data on the number of persons who had a job but
   were not at work due to bad weather. It also provides a measure of the number of
   persons who usually work full time but had reduced hours. Current and historical
   data are available on the  household survey's most requested statistics page at
   http://data.bls.gov/cgi-bin/surveymost?ln.
Technical Note

   This news release presents statistics from two major surveys, the Current
Population Survey (CPS; household survey) and the Current Employment Statistics
survey (CES; establishment survey). The household survey provides information
on the labor force, employment, and unemployment that appears in the "A" tables,
marked HOUSEHOLD DATA. It is a sample survey of about 60,000 eligible households
conducted by the U.S. Census Bureau for the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS).

   The establishment survey provides information on employment, hours, and
earnings of employees on nonfarm payrolls; the data appear in the "B" tables,
marked ESTABLISHMENT DATA. BLS collects these data each month from the payroll
records of a sample of nonagricultural business establishments. Each month
the CES program surveys about 145,000 businesses and government agencies,
representing approximately 557,000 individual worksites, in order to provide
detailed industry data on employment, hours, and earnings of workers on nonfarm
payrolls. The active sample includes approximately one-third of all nonfarm
payroll employees.

   For both surveys, the data for a given month relate to a particular week or
pay period. In the household survey, the reference period is generally the
calendar week that contains the 12th day of the month. In the establishment
survey, the reference period is the pay period including the 12th, which may or
may not correspond directly to the calendar week.

Coverage, definitions, and differences between surveys

   Household survey. The sample is selected to reflect the entire civilian 
noninstitutional population. Based on responses to a series of questions on 
work and job search activities, each person 16 years and over in a sample
household is classified as employed, unemployed, or not in the labor force.

   People are classified as employed if they did any work at all as paid employees
during the reference week; worked in their own business, profession, or on their
own farm; or worked without pay at least 15 hours in a family business or farm.
People are also counted as employed if they were temporarily absent from their jobs
because of illness, bad weather, vacation, labor-management disputes, or personal
reasons.

   People are classified as unemployed if they meet all of the following criteria:
they had no employment during the reference week; they were available for work at
that time; and they made specific efforts to find employment sometime during the
4-week period ending with the reference week. Persons laid off from a job and
expecting recall need not be looking for work to be counted as unemployed. The
unemployment data derived from the household survey in no way depend upon the
eligibility for or receipt of unemployment insurance benefits.

   The civilian labor force is the sum of employed and unemployed persons.
Those persons not classified as employed or unemployed are not in the labor 
force. The unemployment rate is the number unemployed as a percent of the 
labor force. The labor force participation rate is the labor force as a 
percent of the population, and the employment-population ratio is the 
employed as a percent of the population. Additional information about the 
household survey can be found at www.bls.gov/cps/documentation.htm.

   Establishment survey. The sample establishments are drawn from private
nonfarm businesses such as factories, offices, and stores, as well as
from federal, state, and local government entities. Employees on nonfarm
payrolls are those who received pay for any part of the reference pay
period, including persons on paid leave. Persons are counted in each job
they hold. Hours and earnings data are produced for the private sector for
all employees and for production and nonsupervisory employees. Production
and nonsupervisory employees are defined as production and related employees
in manufacturing and mining and logging, construction workers in construction,
and nonsupervisory employees in private service-providing industries.

   Industries are classified on the basis of an establishment’s principal
activity in accordance with the 2012 version of the North American Industry
Classification System. Additional information about the establishment survey
can be found at www.bls.gov/ces/.

   Differences in employment estimates. The numerous conceptual and methodological
differences between the household and establishment  surveys result in important
distinctions in the employment estimates derived from the surveys. Among these are:

   --The household survey includes agricultural workers, self-employed workers
     whose businesses are unincorporated, unpaid family workers, and private
     household workers among the employed. These groups are excluded from the
     establishment survey.

   --The household survey includes people on unpaid leave among the employed.
     The establishment survey does not.

   --The household survey is limited to workers 16 years of age and older.
     The establishment survey is not limited by age.

   --The household survey has no duplication of individuals, because
     individuals are counted only once, even if they hold more than one
     job. In the establishment survey, employees working at more than one
     job and thus appearing on more than one payroll are counted separately
     for each appearance.

Seasonal adjustment

   Over the course of a year, the size of the nation's labor force and the levels
of employment and unemployment undergo regularly occurring fluctuations. These 
events may result from seasonal changes in weather, major holidays, and the opening
and closing of schools. The effect of such seasonal variation can be very large.

   Because these seasonal events follow a more or less regular pattern each year,
their influence on the level of a series can be tempered by adjusting for regular
seasonal variation. These adjustments make nonseasonal developments, such as
declines in employment or increases in the participation of women in the labor
force, easier to spot. For example, in the household survey, the large number of
youth entering the labor force each June is likely to obscure any other changes
that have taken place relative to May, making it difficult to determine if the 
level of economic activity has risen or declined. Similarly, in the establishment
survey, payroll employment in education declines by about 20 percent at the end
of the spring term and later rises with the start of the fall term, obscuring the
underlying employment trends in the industry. Because seasonal employment changes
at the end and beginning of the school year can be estimated, the statistics can be
adjusted to make underlying employment patterns more discernable.  The seasonally
adjusted figures provide a more useful tool with which to analyze changes in
month-to-month economic activity.

   Many seasonally adjusted series are independently adjusted in both the household
and establishment surveys. However, the adjusted series for many major estimates,
such as total payroll employment, employment in most major sectors, total employment,
and unemployment are computed by aggregating independently adjusted component series.
For example, total unemployment is derived by summing the adjusted series for four
major age-sex components; this differs from the unemployment estimate that would be
obtained by directly adjusting the total or by combining
the duration, reasons, or more detailed age categories.

   For both the household and establishment surveys, a concurrent seasonal adjustment
methodology is used in which new seasonal factors are calculated each month using all
relevant data, up to and including the data for the current month. In the household
survey, new seasonal factors are used to adjust only the current month's data. In the
establishment survey, however, new seasonal factors are used each month to adjust the
three most recent monthly estimates. The prior 2 months are routinely revised to
incorporate additional sample reports and recalculated seasonal adjustment factors.
In both surveys, 5-year revisions to historical data are made once a year.

Reliability of the estimates

   Statistics based on the household and establishment surveys are subject to both
sampling and nonsampling error. When a sample, rather than the entire population,
is surveyed, there is a chance that the sample estimates may differ from the true
population values they represent. The component of this difference that occurs
because samples differ by chance is known as sampling error, and its variability
is measured by the standard error of the estimate. There is about a 90-percent
chance, or level of confidence, that an estimate based on a sample will differ by
no more than 1.6 standard errors from the true population value because of sampling
error. BLS analyses are generally conducted at the 90-percent level of confidence.

   For example, the confidence interval for the monthly change in total nonfarm
employment from the establishment survey is on the order of plus or minus 90,000.
Suppose the estimate of nonfarm employment increases by 50,000 from one month to
the next. The 90-percent confidence interval on the monthly change would range from
-40,000 to +140,000 (50,000 +/- 90,000). These figures do not mean that the sample
results are off by these magnitudes, but rather that there is about a 90-percent
chance that the true over-the-month change lies within this interval. Since this
range includes values of less than zero, we could not say with confidence that
nonfarm employment had, in fact, increased that month. If, however, the reported
nonfarm employment rise was 250,000, then all of the values within the 90- percent
confidence interval would be greater than zero. In this case, it is likely (at
least a 90-percent chance) that nonfarm employment had, in fact, risen that month.
At an unemployment rate of around 6.0 percent, the 90-percent confidence interval
for the monthly change in unemployment as measured by the household survey is
about +/- 300,000, and for the monthly change in the unemployment rate it is about
+/- 0.2 percentage point.

   In general, estimates involving many individuals or establishments have lower
standard errors (relative to the size of the estimate) than estimates which are based
on a small number of observations. The precision of estimates also is improved when
the data are cumulated over time, such as for quarterly and annual averages.

   The household and establishment surveys are also affected by nonsampling error,
which can occur for many reasons, including the failure to sample a segment of the
population, inability to obtain information for all respondents in the sample,
inability or unwillingness of respondents to provide correct information on a
timely basis, mistakes made by respondents, and errors made in the collection or
processing of the data.

   For example, in the establishment survey, estimates for the most recent 2 months
are based on incomplete returns; for this reason, these estimates are labeled
preliminary in the tables. It is only after two successive revisions to a monthly
estimate, when nearly all sample reports have been received, that the estimate is
considered final.

   Another major source of nonsampling error in the establishment survey is the
inability to capture, on a timely basis, employment generated by new firms. To
correct for this systematic underestimation of employment growth, an estimation
procedure with two components is used to account for business births. The first
component excludes employment losses from business deaths from sample-based
estimation in order to offset the missing employment gains from business births.
This is incorporated into the sample-based estimation procedure by simply not
reflecting sample units going out of business, but imputing to them the same
employment trend as the other firms in the sample. This procedure accounts for
most of the net birth/death employment.

   The second component is an ARIMA time series model designed to estimate the
residual net birth/death employment not accounted for by the imputation. The
historical time series used to create and test the ARIMA model was derived from
the unemployment insurance universe micro- level database, and reflects the actual
residual net of births and deaths over the past 5 years.

   The sample-based estimates from the establishment survey are adjusted once a
year (on a lagged basis) to universe counts of payroll employment obtained from
administrative records of the unemployment insurance program. The difference 
between the March sample-based employment estimates and the March universe counts
is known as a benchmark revision, and serves as a rough proxy for total survey
error. The new benchmarks also incorporate changes in the classification of
industries. Over the past decade, absolute benchmark revisions for total nonfarm
employment have averaged 0.3 percent, with a range from -0.7 to 0.6 percent.

Other information

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