How are estimates in the CES Survey derived?
Employment estimates are made at the publication cell level and aggregated upward to broader levels of industry detail. A minimum guaranteed publication structure has been defined for all States and MSAs. The structure consists of “expanded” supersectors, which break Manufacturing; Trade, Transportation, and Utilities; and Government into further publication detail. The guaranteed publication cells aggregate to the summary cells of goods-producing, service-providing, total private, and total nonfarm employment. All other published series had to pass a minimum sufficiency test of at least 30 unique unemployment insurance (UI) accounts in its sample, or a minimum universe employment count of 3,000 with at least 50 percent covered by the sample. The series were tested using employment data from the Covered Employment and Wages program (CEW, or ES-202). See www.bls.gov/sae/saenaics.htm#guaranteed for more information. Guaranteed industries that do not pass the minimum sufficiency test are
