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TECHNICAL ASSISTANCE FOR FEDERAL AGENCIES 

IN USING THE 2006-2010 AMERICAN COMMUNITY SURVEY 

EQUAL EMPLOYMENT OPPORTUNITY TABULATION 

Introduction

This document is intended to assist federal agency officials who prepare and submit 

reports pursuant to EEO Management Directive 715 (MD-715). As will be described in 

more detail below, beginning with their Fiscal Year (FY) 2013 MD-715 reports, 

agencies will use the 2006-2010 American Community Survey Equal Employment 

Opportunity Tabulation (EEO Tabulation), which the U.S. Census Bureau (Census) 

released on November 29, 2012.

This document will serve two purposes. First, it will alert EEO Tabulation users to the 

major changes concerning each agency’s data and how it should be formatted for MD715 reporting. It also will highlight the differences between the EEO Tabulation and 

the 2000 Census decennial Data Tool, each of which was designed to provide external 

benchmarks to assist federal agencies in monitoring employment practices and 

enforcing workforce civil rights laws. Second, after identifying and describing those

tables designed for federal agency use, the document lists those elements of the EEO 

Tabulation that should not be used for MD-715 purposes, and explains the reasons. 

Background

Over the past decade, the Office of Personnel Management (OPM): (1) created new 

occupational families and the specific occupations within those families; and (2) 

revised certain occupations within existing families. OPM has also deleted entire 

occupational families (and all the occupations within them), along with certain 

occupations in remaining families.

During this same time period, Census revised the way it collects the socio-economic 

data underlying the decennial reporting cycle behind EEO files covering 1970, 1980, 

1990 and 2000. It eliminated the decennial “long form” and replaced it with an 

ongoing American Community Survey (ACS), which asks the same questions of fewer 

people each year rather than asking more people less frequently. Also, at the request 

of EEOC and other federal agencies responsible for EEO monitoring of the nation’s 

civilian labor force (“CLF”), Census created the above-referenced EEO Tabulation 

based upon ACS data. It can be accessed utilizing Census’s American FactFinder (AFF) 

on-line tool at http://www.census.gov/people/eeotabulation.
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Using the EEO Tabulation

As noted above, beginning in FY 2013, covered agencies will prepare their MD-715 

reports using the EEO Tabulation. In addition to preparing the workforce data tables, 

agencies, after consulting with EEOC’s Office of Federal Operations (OFO), Federal 

Sector Programs (FSP), may conduct additional, more refined workforce analyses 

using the EEO Tabulation to sort employees into both EEOC’s nine federal EEO 

occupational groups (“FedSec9") and the agency’s major occupations. 

http://www.census.gov/people/eeotabulation.

Understanding the Tables

The EEO Tabulation contains fourteen Table Sets, which are tables related by content 

that filter data into specific categories. Federal agency users should concentrate on 

Table Sets 2 and 5 only, which are explained in more detail below. To access the AFF, 

see http://www.census.gov/people/eeotabulation/data/eeotables20062010.html.

The information contained in Table Sets 2 and 5 are similar, except in one respect. 

Table Set 2 applies to major occupations that exemplify an agency’s mission and role 

within the federal government; the particular occupations can vary accordingly. Table 

Set 5 pre-sorts all federal jobs into one of nine (FedSec9) aggregations of occupations 

having similar skill levels, training, mobility, and other labor market characteristics.

All individual federal occupations are provided on a separate table, which contains 

the Census equivalent to each federal occupation. That table, EEOC Federal Sector 

Occupational Cross-Classification Table (“Crosswalk”), can be accessed at 

http://www.eeoc.gov/federal/directives/00-09opmcode.cfm. For each occupation 

listed, the Crosswalk shows (1) the OPM occupation code and title, (2) the FedSec9 

occupational category to which that job is assigned, (3) the external Census title and 

code, and (4) the Office of Management and Budget (“OMB”) Standard Occupational 

Code (“SOC”).

For federal agency users, the similarities between Table Sets 2 and 5 are illustrated in 

more detail below. Each is divided into three subsets, sorted on the basis of United 

States citizenship (which is important because most federal jobs are limited to 

citizens).
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The tables are designated either: 

Table Set 2 - EEO-ALL02R, EEO-CIT02R, EEO-NCIT02R, EEO-ALL02W, EEO-CIT02W, and 

EEO-NCIT02W; 

or 

Table Set 5 - EEO-ALL05R, EEO-CIT05R, EEO-NCIT05R, EEO-ALL05W, EEO-CIT05W, and 

EEO-NCIT05W.

After the prefix “EEO”, which applies to the entire set of tabulations, each set is 

sorted by three additional categories:

1. The letter designation “ALL” covers all members of the CLF 

enumerated in that table set. The letter designations “CIT” and 

“NCIT” sort the observations on the basis of citizenship status, 

between citizens and non-citizens.

2. The numerical designations “02" or “05" tie the information to its 

particular table set, individual or FedSec9.

3. The letter designations “R” and “W” sort the observations on the 

basis of each worker’s residence location or worksite location. 

The R and W designations relate to the labor market geography for each worker. 

Depending on which table is used, the external benchmark of non-federal workers 

employed in equivalent occupations can vary. On that basis, EEOC regards the 

selection of a labor market area for MD-715 reporting purposes to be a critical 

element of each agency’s reporting protocol. This is covered in more detail below.

The tables in both Table Sets 2 and 5 adhere to OMB’s uniform geographic boundary 

specifications, known as the Federal Information Processing System (FIPS) codes. 

Agencies can select levels of geographic specificity that reflect its employment 

practices, its size, and the breadth of its workforce distribution, in terms of total 

numbers, as well as the location of designated activities or organizational 

subcomponents.
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Defining the Geography

In the past, some agencies have defaulted to nationwide data to avoid complex and 

detailed comparisons, and to reflect the presence in all or many states of agency 

staff. The EEO Tabulation permits, when appropriate, labor markets below the 

nationwide level, especially when recruitment and hiring is done on a more localized 

basis and/or where applicant tracking data shows that persons applied only from a 

specific geographic area.

For EEO comparisons and MD-715 reporting purposes, agencies are instructed to use 

the Worksite (W) tables when benchmarking within specific geographic locations. 

Worksite tables reflect the distribution of jobs in a particular area on the basis of 

where employer facilities are located and the work is actually performed, both in the 

federal and private sectors. Where recruitment and hiring is done at the national 

level, agencies should use the Residence (R) tables. Thus, the fact that some 

agencies previously used Residence-based data because of problems obtaining 

comparable Worksite information, no longer constitutes a valid basis to do so, 

beginning with the FY 2013 reporting cycle, other than when dealing with U.S. totals 

and nationwide labor markets. 

Even at the FedSec9 level of occupational aggregation shown in Table Set 5, it is less 

likely that an agency should use the nationwide option for all of its occupational 

categories. However, the nationwide (R tables) are appropriate when the agency: 

employs large numbers of workers in most states; benchmarks against Officials and 

Managers, and the Professional workers categories, (because these categories are 

often recruited nationally); or the category constitutes a substantial segment of that 

agency’s workforce. Otherwise, availability can be calculated using an agency’s own 

regional structure and then aggregated into a weighted average, or some other 

intermediate configuration. 

A third, more local option can reflect the more localized labor markets that generally 

apply to blue-collar wage grade (“WG”) workers, as well as technical, administrative 

support, and service workers in the general schedule (“GS”) ranks. As with all aspects 

of this Guidance, technical assistance is available from EEOC’s OFO/FSP staff, contact 

information provided on the last page of this document.

A few additional factors should be kept in mind when working with the EEO 

Tabulation. After selecting the appropriate table from the options described above, 

the next step is to specify the geographic level that will be used (before going to the 

next step of identifying the particular major occupation(s) or the FedSec9 
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occupational aggregations). For MD-715 purposes, the range of geographic levels is: 

nationwide, agency region (FIPS), state, or county of 50,000 people or more. Beyond 

those options, the most refined level (using Census terminology) is Place, which refers 

to cities, towns, or other places of 50,000 or more persons.

The importance of Place, when combined with the W, Worksite option, is three-fold. 

First, because the distribution of residential patterns in terms of race or national 

origin (“RNO”) sometimes differs from the distribution of available work in the same 

labor market area, benchmark availability estimates often vary between the two. 

The EEO Tabulation automatically takes into account both those who live and work in 

a particular location, and those who commute to jobs in that specific location but live 

elsewhere. 

Second, the Worksite tables have a sub-option that lists the locations from which 

people commute and provides the total commute flow. For each Worksite, this option 

identifies up to nine specific in-commutes, plus a residual composed of all individuals 

not otherwise coming from one of those locations. While MD-715 does not require 

commute-pattern information, such detail helps clarify anomalies that are revealed 

by analysis at that level. For example, an agency may find that a low participation 

rate for a RNO group could result from a lack of hiring from one specific contributing 

flow which contains a significant number of workers from that RNO group. Agencies 

are encouraged to use this approach with several of their most populous major 

occupations in the event that low participation rates or other anomalies are present

and affect employment by RNO or sex.

Third, the accuracy of external availability estimates is increased when facilities are 

located in large counties, where there may be a multiple number of places that 

reflect worksite and commute flows within that larger geographic pattern. Los 

Angeles County, California, illustrates this point. 

The absence of detailed occupational data for geographic areas of less than 50,000 

persons on the EEO Tabulation is because of Census Bureau’s confidentiality 

standards, which prohibit repeated cross-tabulations that could reveal the identity of 

specific individuals in Table Set 2. Because occupations in Table Set 5 are already 

aggregated into only nine categories, the geographic limit increases to areas of fewer 

than 100,000 when analyses are done at the FedSec9 level.

As specified above, agencies may only use Table Sets 2 and 5 for MD-715 analysis and 

reporting purposes. To understand more fully why other Table Sets should not be 
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used, agency EEO and Human Resources (“HR”) officials may be aided by the 

following information:

Whereas Table Set 1 contains much of the data that is found in Table Set 

2, it does not sort on the basis of citizenship status. Table Set 1 is thus 

suited for private sector employer comparisons, but not for the federal 

sector.

Table Set 1 also contains some occupations that are populated only in 

the private sector but not in federal employment. Table Set 2 only 

covers occupations listed with a Census title and code and a SOC code,

and that have federal counterparts. Furthermore, because OPM 

currently lists 681 individual GS and WG occupations, but the EEO 

Tabulation contains only 487 occupations, some federal jobs must be 

compared to the same external availability standard.

Table Sets 3, 4 and 6 cover non-federal employment at aggregated 

occupational level. Table Set 4 sorts the 487 Census occupations into 

the nine private sector categories used by EEOC’s EEO-1 annual report 

form, while Table Set 3 conforms to a fourteen category alternative 

EEOC format. Similarly, Table Set 6 is used by the Department of Justice 

to compare state and local government employment to external 

availability for public jobs below the federal level, as covered by the 

EEO-4 survey. 

Table Sets 7 through 14 contain occupational information sorted on the 

basis of age, income levels, industry, and educational attainment. 

Although EEOC has jurisdiction over the Age Discrimination in 

Employment Act, age is not a component of MD-715’s affirmative 

employment requirements. The other variables enumerated above 

affect non-federal employment, especially in the private sector, but do 

not result in similar differences based on RNO or sex in the analysis of 

the federal workforce.

One additional limitation should be noted. While both Table Sets 2 and 5 include 

geographic options for Census-defined “Metro” or “Micro” Statistical Areas, they are 

not part of the labor market alternative set recognized for MD-715 reporting because 

of methodological limitations that can result in substantial inaccuracy. Several issues 

contribute to this problem. These include the assumption that availability by RNO 

status is uniformly distributed throughout the entire Area, as it would need to be for 
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the estimate to be valid, and the issue of Areas composed of several counties where 

the worksite versus residence differences, along with the differential in- and outcommute patterns encountered across Metro Area boundaries, distort availability 

estimates by RNO and sex.

Selecting the Occupation

After defining the geography, agencies must identify its major occupations for 

benchmarking. The Crosswalk referred to earlier in this Guidance was updated in 

January, 2013, and provides the appropriate Census occupation code for each federal 

occupation. When utilizing the Census AFF tool, agencies will use the Census code 

identified by the Crosswalk to conduct its workforce benchmarking. 

EEOC will amend the Crosswalk whenever OPM adds, deletes or modifies an 

occupational series. It is possible that an agency’s current occupational distribution, 

using OPM GS and WG codes and titles, may include instances where a specific series 

is no longer active. Technical assistance concerning occupational cross-classification 

or the Crosswalk can be obtained from staff within EEOC’s Office of Federal 

Operations.

Additional Information

Aggregation and Allocation

The EEO Tab tables follow a uniform format in displaying race and ethnicity data. For 

MD-715 purposes, agencies must modify the data. When reporting data, agencies 

must aggregate and report their workforce data as follows:

1. The two columns under Hispanic or Latino must be combined. These are 

identified as “White alone Hispanic or Latino” and “All other Hispanic or 

Latino.”

2. The population within the category of “White and Black” must be combined 

and included in the “Black or African-American alone” category.

3. The population within the category of “White and AIAN” must be combined and 

included in the “American Indian and Alaska Native alone” category.

4. The population within the category of “White and Asian” must be combined 

and included in the “Asian alone” category.

5. The population within the category of “Black and AIAN” must be included in 

the “Two or more races” category.
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6. The balance of the “Not Hispanic or Latino, two or more races” must be

included in the “Two or more races” category. 

For more information, please see OMB BULLETIN NO. 00-02 - Guidance on Aggregation 

and Allocation of Data on Race for Use in Civil Rights Monitoring and Enforcement.

Puerto Rico Community Survey

The Puerto Rico Community Survey (PRCS) is the equivalent of the ACS for Puerto 

Rico, and began data collection in 2005. Data results from both the ACS and the PRCS 

are released together as a unified American Community Survey dataset. However, 

the PRCS data is not included in the U.S. totals for the ACS. Agencies should not 

modify the U.S. totals to include the PRCS data. 

Where an agency is benchmarking labor market geography against a specific 

occupation, and Puerto Rico is a significant source of applicants, the agency should 

include Puerto Rico as a part of its labor market. Using the AFF tool, Puerto Rico can 

be added to a labor market through a sort of the “State” options.

Technical Assistance

Technical assistance with issues raised in this document can be obtained from staff 

within EEOC’s Office of Federal Operations (ofo.eeoc@eeoc.gov, or 202-663-4599). In 

addition, a list of additional questions and answers (“Q&A”) can be found at 

http://www.eeoc.gov/.