Produces estimates of occupational employment, employment, and occupational wages. Occupational employment is defined as the number of employees in a given occupation. The OES program produces estimates of occupational employment by industry, that is, the number of employees in a given occupation in a given industry. Employment is obtained by aggregating the occupational employment by industry estimates for a given occupation. An occupation's employment estimate is the sum of that occupation's estimates from the industries in which it was surveyed.
Occupational wages are the wages paid to employees in a given occupation.
Establishments are asked to report how many workers they employ in a given occupation in each of several wage ranges. With this data, the OES program produces various estimates of wages by occupation. The survey does not cover the self-employed, owners and partners in unincorporated firms, household workers, or unpaid family workers. OES estimates are calculated from data which employers provide by filling out a survey form. There are different survey forms for different industries.