Monthly estimates of private wages and salaries are based on monthly industry data from the current employment statistics (CES) survey tabulated by the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS). In addition to employment data on all workers, the CES collects data on hours and earnings of production and nonsupervisory workers who are on private nonfarm payrolls. The earnings reported in the CES include regular and overtime earnings, but do not include “irregular” pay, such as bonuses or the gain on the exercise of stock options. As a result, the CES covers the regular and overtime earnings for about two-thirds of all workers and a little over half of total earnings.
Like other NIPA estimates, the estimates of wages and salaries are revised when more comprehensive and accurate source data become available. The first revisions to the BEA monthly wage and salary data reflect revisions to the monthly CES survey. These revisions are generally small.
The first wage and salary estimates for a quarter are the average of the monthly estimates based on the CES survey. Five months after the end of a quarter, wage and salary data from the BLS quarterly census of employment and wages (QCEW) become available. The QCEW covers almost all employed workers, and its wage measure is more comprehensive than the CES because it includes bonuses and the gain on the exercise of stock options. BEA revises its quarterly wage and salary estimates when the QCEW data become available by replacing the quarterly estimates that had been derived from the monthly CES data with seasonally adjusted QCEW data. Because irregular pay items, such as bonuses and stock options, are volatile, the revisions to some quarters may be large. Prior to 2002, the QCEW data were incorporated once a year during the annual (July) revision. Their incorporation has been accelerated to improve the national accounts by providing more timely and accurate estimates.
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