BLS Regional Offices

tem by 30 States by 1991 improved the efficiency
and technical sophistication of the survey in most
cases. The system, which is maintained for BLs by
the Iowa agency, allows all States that use it to
stay up to date with the latest technical improve-
ments and ensures that the best techniques are
used,

The regional offices have also played a crucial
Tole in the ongoing restructuring of the employ-
ment survey. Regional staff have installed the new
computer system in the States, have provided ex-
tensive training and technical assistance in helping
States utilize electronic collection methodology,
and have worked closely with State staffs in ana-
lyzing employment levels and trends. This work
has been performed in addition to regular training
and technical assistance activities,

Occupational safety and health statistics

The Bureau began to give attention to industrial
accidents and diseases in the years preceding
World War I. A number of studies were done on
work-related injuries in specific industries and on
individual industrial diseases. Beginning in 1910,
an annual report on accident rates in the iron and
steel industry was issued. A few years later, the
Bureau established cooperative arrangements for
reporting accidents with the States of Massachu-
setts, Ohio, and New York.

In 1926, Bis began an annual survey of occu-
pational injuries in a group of manufacturing in-
dustries. The survey was based on records from
several States, supplemented by reports from es-
tablishments. In succeeding years, the survey ex-
panded to cover all manufacturing and mining
industries. Annual reports on the frequency and
severity of industrial injuries were issued. The
States cooperating in the work injury program did
not receive funding from the Bureau; however,
they received supplies of standard Bis data col-
lection forms and data review instructions. The
number of cooperating States increased gradually;
by 1970, 14 states were participating.

The Occupational Safety and Health Act was
enacted in December 1970 and significantly
changed the need for statistical information. The
Act provided for a Federal-State statistical pro-
gram, to be directed by Ls. Participating State
agencies, designated by the State Governor,
would receive 50-percent Federal funding and 50-
percent State funding. The Act mandated that
businesses keep records of occupational injuries
and illnesses and report them, when required, to
BLS or the cooperating State agencies. Initially, BLs
was assigned responsibility for the recordkeeping
system, as well as the statistical survey.

In 1971, regional offices were faced with the
major undertaking of contacting the designated

40 Monthly Labor Review December 1992

State agencies, negotiating grants, and beginning
to work with them on initiating a new survey de-
signed to measure the incidence rates and lost
workdays associated with workplace injuries and
illnesses. In addition, regional offices had to make
businesses aware of a new required recordkeeping
system for occupational injuries and illnesses and
had to advise them on its use. For several years,
much time and effort on the part of the regional
offices went into giving seminars on recordkeep-
ing for business personnel and responding to their
questions and concerns regarding the new system.

To obtain more detailed information on the
causes, nature, and sources of occupational inju-
Ties, as well as on the parts of the body affected, a
supplementary data system was developed to ex-
tract information from worker’s compensation
records. Beginning in 1976, States participated in
this endeavor on a matching funds basis. Because
of scarcities in State funding, however, not all
States were able to participate in either the annual
survey or the supplementary data system. The lat-
ter was discontinued in 1989, and the Bureau’s
recordkeeping responsibilities were transferred to
the Occupational Safety and Health Administra-
tion in 1991.

BLS is currently restructuring the safety and
health statistics program. A program to obtain a
census of workplace fatalities was inaugurated in
1991. Another program, to measure both the inci-
dence of injuries and illnesses and the characteris-
tics of the more serious cases, will be introduced in
January 1993. Once again, regional offices are
working with States to introduce them to the re-
quirements of these new programs.

The role of the regional offices

As the Federal-State programs have changed, the
work of the regional staff dedicated to those pro-
grams also has evolved. Bis has provided com-
puter-processing systems for all of the Federal-
State surveys to those States that want and can use
them. Regional staff install the systems and pro-
vide continuing assistance on their use. With on-
going improvement and change in these statistical
Programs, regional offices now give much atten-
tion to training. Extensive training is provided to
State staffs in the form of coaching. In addition,
regional staff serve as instructors in formal courses
that have been developed to train both State and
BLS staffs on the technical aspects of the Federal-
State programs. A variety of approaches to im-
proving quality requires major commitments of
staff time. The quickened pace of methodological
change challenges regional offices to provide the
leadership to maintain effective operations in a de-
centralized system. Competent administration of
the cooperative agreements between BLs and the


agencies, became fully responsible for the pro-
grams in the mid-1980’s.

To fund the Federal-State statistical programs,
the Bureau, beginning with fiscal year 1984, used
a type of grant, termed a cooperative agreement,
that is designed for funding joint endeavors. The
Tegional offices were assigned responsibility for
the administration of the cooperative agreements
with the State employment security agencies, and
the regional commissioners were designated grant
officers. The assistant regional commissioners for
Federal-State programs were given direct respon-
sibility for both the administrative and technical
work with the States. The regional offices negoti-
ated initial cooperative agreements with the States
in 1983 and have renegotiated them every year
since then. Financial management of the coopera-
tive agreements, including monitoring them, has
been an ongoing regional activity.

Change from rising expectations

The Bureau’s assumption of full responsibility for
labor market information statistics ushered in a
period of change for these employment and unem-
ployment measures that is scheduled to continue
into the next century. BLs and associated State
agencies are responding to the long-term increas-
ing trend in the use of these data and the rising
expectations of users regarding the data’s accu-
racy and comprehensiveness. The result has been
intensified research and an emphasis on quality
control and quality enhancement.

A major focus of these efforts is improving
the quality of the quarterly employment and
wages information that is compiled from em-
ployer unemployment insurance tax filings. Spe-
cial attention is being directed toward improving
the quality of information on industrial classifi-
cation and location for establishments. A com-
panion effort is the development of a list of
business establishments from the improved file,
to be used as a sampling frame for a number of
major BLS surveys.

The Bureau contracted with the Utah State
agency to develop and maintain a computer sys-
tem for States to use to process information on
employment and wages. The system is being
adopted by most States. It provides processing ef-
ficiencies, incorporates the latest methodological
advances, and affords a way for States to keep up
with technical changes in the employment and
wages program.

The information compiled from employer un-
employment insurance tax filings is utilized in a
number of widely used economic indicators, ei-
ther as an important data base or as a sampling
frame. Thus, the quality improvement work that is
underway has a considerable impact.

The role of the regional offices in this effort has
been crucial. Since the mid-1980's, regional staff
have worked intensively with States to institute a
series of technical improvements to the files com-
piled from unemployment insurance tax records.
Among these improvements are new data review
procedures, a continuing 3-year survey of indus-
trial activity to enhance industry classification,
upgraded data collection procedures for multiunit
firms, and the addition of informational items to
improve the file for use as a sampling frame. Re-
gional staff have installed the computer system in
States and provided continuing assistance on its
use.

Because local area unemployment statistics are
used to allocate Federal training funds, demand
for these statistics is high. Further, interest has in-
tensified in their use as State and area economic
indicators. Accordingly, BLS has maintained a
continuing program of research on the methodol-
ogy used to produce such statistics. As a result of
this research, since the mid-1980’s, the regional
offices have introduced to the States a revised esti-
mation model, seasonal adjustment of data, and a
comprehensive computer system for calculating
the statistics. Regional staff provide the States
with ongoing advice on and assistance with the
operation of the computer system and the use of
the estimation model.

A new development in occupational employ-
ment statistics is the collection of information on
occupational wage rates, along with that on occu-
pational employment. Regional staff have worked
for several years with a limited number of States
that have volunteered to test this approach to ob-
taining information on occupational wages.

It is in the business employment survey, how-
ever, where expectations of users have risen the
most. To meet those rising expectations, BLs re-
search has focused on advanced techniques of col-
lecting the data. The survey has been studied to
identify improvements for 20 years, with the ini-
tial payoff having been the successful effort to in-
crease the sample for the first estimate. Research
intensified after BLs was assigned full responsibil-
ity for the program in the mid-1980’s. Following
extensive research into the collection of data by
computer-assisted telephone interviewing and by
touchtone data entry, substantial numbers of re-
spondents are now being converted to these meth-
ods. It has been discovered that the use of such
methods for collecting employment, payroll, and
hours data can improve both the timeliness and
quality of the information. Work is also progress-
ing on improving benchmarks for the national,
State, and local employment series.

The Bureau contracted with the Iowa agency to
develop a computer system to process the employ-
ment survey for States. The adoption of this sys-

Monthly Labor Review December 1992 39


States by the regional offices is essential to the ef-
fective, equitable functioning of the Federal-State
system.

Over the years, the regional offices have nour-
ished the cooperative relationship between the
States and Bis. They have been influential in
molding the Federal-State operational structure
in both its formal and informal aspects. Until sLs
established regional offices, the working ar-
rangements with States never developed into a
complete, functional system for operating major
statistical programs. The regional offices con-
tinue to occupy a key role in the evolution of the
Bureau’s Federal-State programs. Oo

Footnotes

‘ Joseph P. Goldberg and William T. Moye, The First
Hundred Years of the Bureau of Labor Statistics, Bulletin

2235 (Bureau of Labor Statistics, September 1985), p. 14.
2 “Unemployment conditions and relief,” Monthly Labor
Review, December 1928, p. 40.
* Goldberg and Moye, The First Hundred Years, p. 164.

* Dudley E. Young, Cooperative Federal-State Statistical
Programs~~Past, Present, and Future, unpublished (Bureau
of Labor Statistics, December 1962), p. 23.

5 Activities of the Bureau of Labor Statistics in World War
II, Historical Reports of War Administration, No. | (Bureau
of Labor Statistics, June 1947), pp. 14-15.

® Goldberg and Moye, The First Hundred Years, p. 187.

? Ibid., p. 191.

* Tomorrow's Manpower Needs: National Manpower
Projections and a Guide to Their Use as a Tool in Developing
State and Area Manpower Projections, Bulletin 1606 (Bu-
reau of Labor Statistics, February 1969).

° Memorandum of Agreement on the Respnsibilities for
Conducting Selected Statistical Programs in the Department
of Labor and State Agencies, signed by the Assistant Secre-
tary for Manpower and the Commissioner of Labor Statistics,
Washington, oc, October 24, 1972.

Room at the top

‘Equal opportunities’ in organizations, if it means nothing else to those who
introduce the policy, means ending the sexual division of labor. It means
breaking down the barriers that prevent horizontal movement by women into
nontraditional jobs, and removing those that confine women to the meanest
jobs and prevent their vertical progress to different levels and locations in the
hierarchy. It says to women, ‘There's room at the top.” This is the first item on
the agenda of positive action in all organizations. It entails opening access to
the organization by fair recruitment practices, supplementary training courses
for women; a review of procedures for appraisal and promotion; and ultimately
an acknowledgment of the abilities and authority women thus develop, as man-
agers, technologists, professionals.

—Cynthia Cockbum

In the Way of Women: Men's Resistance
to Sex Equality in Organizations
(Ithaca, NY, ILR Press, 1991), p. 46.

Monthly Labor Review December 1992 41



BLS regional offices: 50 years
of Federal-State cooperation

Since 1942, regional offices of the Bureau of Labor Statistics

have been the linchpin in promoting and carrying out
Federal-State cooperative arrangements; regional office personnel
have played diverse roles, from assisting with surveys

and new technology to training State staffs

Joseph W. Hines he 50th anniversary of the establishment
and of the BLs regional offices is a good time to
Gunnar Engen look back on the evolution of cooperation

between the Bureau and the State employment se-
curity agencies on employment and unemploy-
ment statistics. It is a good time as well to take
note of BLs-State cooperation in regard to occupa-
tional safety and health statistics and to assess the
contributions of regional office staff in both of
these areas. During the past 50 years, these Fed-
eral-State programs have gradually expanded
from a few surveys in manufacturing and mining
to complex systems that often provide extensive
geographic and industrial information. Their cur-
rent emphasis is on improving the quality and reli-
ability of the data they present. The efforts of the
tegional offices have been central to the success of
this Federal-State cooperation.

Carroll D. Wright, the first Bs Commissioner,
sought to obtain cooperative arrangements with
State labor agencies as early as 1885. He envi-
sioned a nationwide network of collaborating
State and Federal agents. “ ‘A powerful chain of
investigators,” he called it. He planned, he said in
1885, to ask Congress to authorize a system
whereby the Federal Bureau could compensate
State agencies for their assistance and to allow the

Joseph W. Hines is a senior Federal Bureau to place agents in States without
economist in the Office bureaus.”"

of Field Operations, Bureau
of Labor Statistics. Gunnar .
Engen is Regional Commis- Early Federal-State cooperation

gen is Regional Com
gional ofiee Bucs” It was 1916, however, when New York State be-

of Labor Statistics, came the first State to enter into an agreement with

36 Monthly Labor Review December 1992

BLS to collect and share payroll employment infor-
mation for several manufacturing and mining in-
dustries. The preceding year, the Bureau had begun
a monthly mail survey to collect payroll employ-
ment data from businesses and compile statistics
for a limited number of manufacturing and mining
industries. Agreements to collect and share estab-
lishment employment data were reached with
Wisconsin in 1920 and with Ilinois in 1922. By
October 1928, it was reported that “The Bureau of
Labor Statistics cooperates with the State Labor
Departments in seven States.”” By 1935, 12 States
were participating in the collection of employment
data, and the figure rose to 17 in 1939.3

When States began to identify a need for
State- and area-level employment statistics, con-
cern about duplication of reporting and the asso-
ciated burden on respondents provided an
impetus for developing cooperative Federal-
State arrangements.‘ In addition, the opportunity
to achieve consistency between State-to-State
and national employment statistics was appeal-
ing to researchers.

Setting the stage for expansion

Temporary regional offices were established early
in World War I (1941-42) to assist the Office of
Price Administration and the National War Labor
Board.’ The regional offices were consolidated
and regional directors appointed in 1944, The re-
gional offices achieved permanent status in 1945
and were assigned the responsibility of working
with the cooperating State agencies. An employ-



ment analyst was assigned to each office in 1947.

At the beginning of the post-World War II pe-
Tiod, the Bureau of Labor Statistics and the Bureau
of Employment Security (a predecessor of the
Employment and Training Administration in the
Department of Labor) reached an agreement to
sponsor jointly a nationwide system of State- and
area-level employment statistics through arrange-
ments with State employment security agencies.
These were the agencies that administered State
unemployment insurance systems and State em-
ployment services. Each of the two Federal bu-
reaus was to provide half of the necessary
Tesources to the cooperating State agencies, with
the Bureau of Employment Security having ad-
ministrative responsibility and Bis technical re-
sponsibility for the program. The State- and
area-level statistics program would provide data
needed for planning by the State employment
services and unemployment insurance systems. It
would also provide basic indicators of economic
activity for the subnational areas within its pur-
view. The payroll employment data collected
from business establishments by the States would
be used by the Washington office of BLs in pre-
paring establishment employment estimates for
the Nation.

The BLs regional offices immediately set about
working out cooperative arrangements with addi-
tional States. During the 1946-1949 period, 32
States entered into cooperative arrangements.®
Although it had taken 29 years to develop such
arrangements with one-third of the States, with a
new regional office system and a financial agree-
ment between BLs and the Bureau of Employment
Security, the remaining two-thirds joined within 4
years,

The Employment Statistics Survey

Regional employment analysts assisted in the
transfer of the national employment statistics
sample to the States. They guided State staffs in
the expansion of the sample to support State- and
area-level statistics. They also helped the State
staffs compile benchmarks or universe counts to
establish employment levels using unemployment
insurance tax reports, supplemented by data from
other sources (including surveys of employers in
some sectors). In addition, regional employment
analysts worked with States to institute uniform
data review and editing procedures and advised on
estimation to develop a consistent approach from
State to State.

The decade of the 1950’s was a period of im-
provement and expansion in establishment em-
ployment statistics. Procedures and techniques
were refined. Systematic review and follow-up
with respondents resulted in improved data and

more complete reporting of the requested items:
employment, payroll, and hours. Larger samples
made possible increased industrial and geographic
detail. In turn, with better data and larger samples,
States were able to publish statistics on average
hours and average earnings of production work-
ers, as well as employment estimates.

The Bureau responded to a growing interest in
local labor market information by shifting a na-
tional labor turnover statistics survey to the States
in 1956. Regional analysts assisted States in ex-
panding samples to support State-level data and
taught standardized data review procedures and
estimation techniques to the State staffs.

Responsibility for the collection and publica-
tion of statistics on State and local government
employment was transferred from the Bureau of
the Census to the Bureau of Labor Statistics in
1955. State samples had to be expanded to sup-
port State- and area-level statistics. In order to
evaluate the quality of the data collected, re-
gional offices visited respondents and conducted
response analysis surveys. Respondents to the
employment survey were interviewed in 1955,
respondents to the labor turnover survey in
1956.

The impact of new ideas in the 1960’s

The 1960's brought increased interest in the work-
ings of the labor market and an expanded demand
for information on the market, particularly at the
local level. It was a time of new ideas that led to
experimentation with new surveys. Experimenta-
tion with the collection of data on job vacancies
began in mid-decade. Regional offices conducted
a series of pilot surveys in 20 cities designed to
evaluate definitions, different collection forms,
and acceptance of the survey by respondents.’

During the period from July 1968 through June
1969, BLs regional offices and the Census Bureau.
surveyed slum areas in six large cities. These Ur-
ban Employment Surveys were designed as pilot
studies to provide information on urban social
problems.

The Vocational Education Act of 1963 called
for information on future occupational require-
ments for use in planning education and training
programs, BLs responded by developing a method-
ology for making occupational employment pro-
jections at the State level.’ Regional office staff
provided advice to State employment security
agencies on the use of this methodology. At the
end of the decade, the regional offices experi-
mented with collecting employment information
classified by occupation from samples of employ-
ers visited by regional staff.

While the experimental activities were going
on, regional staff continued to work with cooper-

Monthly Labor Review December 1992 37


BLS Regional Offices

ating State agencies. Together, they improved the
coverage of the sample, quality of the data, and
reliability of the estimates in the employment and
labor turnover surveys.

Expansion of responsibilities

The outgrowth of the experimentation with job
vacancy data was a decision to integrate the col-
lection of those data with the collection of labor
tumover statistics. A survey was inaugurated in
1969 to collect both types of data monthly in large
metropolitan areas. However, the survey proved
to be difficult to initiate and maintain, and the sta-
tistics were not used as extensively as had been
anticipated. Consequently, the collection of job
vacancy data was terminated in 1974.

The analytical and experimental work on oc-
cupational employment led to the establishment
of a mail survey in 1971 in cooperation with the
State employment security agencies. The pro-
gram started in a limited number of States and
gradually expanded coverage until 48 States
were covered by 1982.

The bis role in labor market information was
rounded out in November 1972, when Secretary
of Labor T. D. Hodgson transferred technical re-
sponsibility for the Manpower Administration’s
labor market information programs, which were
conducted in cooperation with the State employ-
ment security agencies, to the Bureau. These pro-
grams produced (1) estimates of labor force,
employment, and unemployment in local areas
and States; (2) a quarterly report of employment,
wages, and contributions; (3) occupational projec-
tions; and (4) characteristics of the insured unem-
ployed. The memorandum of agreement between
the Manpower Administration and the Bureau
stated that “It is hoped that the centralization of
these programs [in Bs] will afford us a better op-
portunity to work together to improve technical
aspects of the system, the quality of data and the
timeliness of the information outputs to all the us-
ers of these data.””

With the assumption of technical responsibility
for local area unemployment statistics, the Bureau
undertook an extensive research effort to improve
the methodology. The use of local unemployment
data for allocating Federal grants to States and lo-
calities was mandated by the Comprehensive Em-
ployment and Training Act of 1973 and related
legislation. Hence, it was necessary that these sta-
tistics be constructed to maximize comparability
from place to place. Regional staff assisted the
States in implementing the new methodology and
subsequent improvements arising out of ongoing
BLs research. In addition, regional staff helped
States respond to the many questions resulting
from changes in these sensitive local economic in-

38 Monthly Labor Review December 1992

t

dicators and fund allocators.

At the national level, establishment employ-
ment statistics were becoming of increasing im-
portance as the economy came under closer and
closer scrutiny. This importance intensified even
further with the onset of the 1974-75 recession.
The focus of interest centered on the first, prelimi-
nary employment estimate each month. The Bu-
reau responded by taking steps to improve the
sample for the preliminary estimate. In this, BLS
had the critical support of the cooperating State
agencies that collected, reviewed, and transmitted
the sample data to the national office. Bs regional
staff worked with the States on procedures to
speed up the collection, processing, and transmis-
sion of data. By the end of the 1970’s, the Bureau
had established the capability of obtaining sample
employment data from the States electronically.
Regional staffs provided technical assistance to
the States to enable them to switch to telecom-
Mmunicating data and have provided ongoing as-
sistance to maintain an effective network.

The sis labor market information programs
were under budgetary pressure during most of the
last part of the 1970's and in the early 1980's. The
Bureau’s responsibility to compile and dissemi-
nate information on the characteristics of the in-
sured unemployed was never fully implemented.
The joint work on occupational employment
projections with the State employment security
agencies was dropped after priorities were
weighed. Similarly, the labor turnover statistics
program was discontinued in 1982 under budget-
ary pressure. The quarterly report on employ-
ment, wages, and contributions continued in a
maintenance mode, although it was recognized
that it had serious problems with quality.

Labor market information

The Wagner-Peyzer Act of 1933 mandated that
States conduct labor market research, with funding
and oversight authority assigned to the U. S. De-
partment of Labor. In 1983, the Employment and
Training Administration, successor agency to the
Manpower Administration, which, in turn, had re-
placed the Bureau of Employment Security, trans-
ferred full responsibility for planning, managing,
and funding three programs—the business em-
ployment survey; the estimates of labor force,
employment, and unemployment in local areas
and States; and occupational employment statis-
tics—to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Three
years later, funding and management authority for
the quarterly report on employment, wages, and
contributions was also transferred to Bs. Thus, the
Bureau, which, in 1972, had acquired technical re-
sponsibility for the labor market information pro-
grams conducted by State employment security

|