Current Employment Statistics Preliminary Benchmark (National) News Release

For release 10:00 a.m. (ET) Tuesday, September 9, 2025                          USDL- 25-1352

 
Technical information: (202) 691-6555  *  cesinfo@bls.gov   *  www.bls.gov/ces
Media contact:         (202) 691-5902  *  PressOffice@bls.gov
 
Current Employment Statistics Preliminary Benchmark (National) - March 2025
 
The preliminary estimate of the Current Employment Statistics (CES) national benchmark revision 
to total nonfarm employment for March 2025 is -911,000 (-0.6 percent), the U.S. Bureau of Labor 
Statistics reported today. The annual benchmark revisions over the last 10 years have an absolute 
average of 0.2 percent of total nonfarm employment. In accordance with usual practice, the final 
benchmark revision will be issued in February 2026 with the publication of the January 2026 
Employment Situation news release.

Each year, CES employment estimates are benchmarked to comprehensive counts of employment from the 
Quarterly Census of Employment and Wages (QCEW). These counts are derived primarily from state 
unemployment insurance (UI) tax records that nearly all employers are required to file with state 
workforce agencies. 

The preliminary benchmark revision reflects the difference between two independently derived 
employment counts, each subject to their own sources of error. It serves as a preliminary measure 
of the total error in CES employment estimates from March 2024 to March 2025. Preliminary research, 
which is not comprehensive and is subject to updates in QCEW data, indicates that the primary 
contributors to the overestimation of employment growth are likely the result of two sources—response 
error and nonresponse error. First, businesses reported less employment to the QCEW than they 
reported to the CES survey (response error). Second, businesses who were selected for the CES survey 
but did not respond reported less employment to the QCEW than those businesses who did respond to 
the CES survey (nonresponse error). Estimates of other errors, such as the forecast error from the 
net birth-death model, are not available at this time. Information on how the net birth-death 
forecasts have reduced benchmark revisions historically are available on the CES Birth-Death Model 
Frequently Asked Questions page in question 10, www.bls.gov/web/empsit/cesbdqa.htm.

The preliminary benchmark revisions in table 1 are calculated only for March 2025 for the major 
industry sectors. As is typically the case, many of the individual industry series show larger 
percentage revisions than the total nonfarm series, primarily because statistical sampling error is 
greater at more detailed levels than at an aggregated level. 

Official establishment survey estimates are not updated based on this preliminary benchmark revision. 
The final benchmark revision will be incorporated into official estimates with the publication of the 
January 2026 Employment Situation news release in February 2026.

 
___________
The final benchmark revision will be released in February 2026 with the January 2026 Employment 
Situation news release.

Technical Note

The preliminary March revision amounts presented in this 
release are intended to give a preview of the revisions 
to the Bureau of Labor Statistics Current Employment 
Statistics (CES) data released in February of each year.
Currently published CES data have not been adjusted to new 
levels based on these preliminary revision amounts. 

The preliminary March revisions are calculated by 
comparing not seasonally adjusted CES employment for March 
of the benchmark year to universe employment counts derived 
mostly from Quarterly Census of Employment and Wage (QCEW) 
data. Additional employment not covered by the QCEW is 
calculated from several sources including County Business 
Patterns and Annual Survey of Public Employment & Payroll 
data from the Census Bureau, state employment data, and 
data from the Railroad Retirement Board. This noncovered  
employment is added to QCEW employment to arrive at a universe 
employment total. The preliminary March CES revision amounts are 
the universe employment minus the CES estimated employment. 
More information about CES benchmarking is available in 
the Handbook of Methods in the Calculations section on 
Benchmarking, www.bls.gov/opub/hom/ces/calculation.htm#benchmark. 
More information about noncovered employment is available 
in the Handbook of Methods in the Calculations 
section on Noncovered employment, 
www.bls.gov/opub/hom/ces/calculation.htm#noncovered-employment.

As with all surveys, the CES survey is subject to several types
of error including sampling and nonsampling error. Sampling error 
measures how different the sample is from the population. 
Nonsampling error includes frame error (how different the 
population is now from when the sample was drawn), non-response 
error (how different those units who responded to the survey are 
from those units that did not respond), and response error (how 
different responses were to the survey versus the population for 
units that responded to both). Nonsampling errors can come from 
either the survey data or the population data. In the case of the 
CES survey, the benchmark revision is the difference between two 
independently derived employment counts, each subject to its own 
error sources.

Universe employment for March is calculated and compared to the 
CES estimates at the basic cell level and then aggregated up to 
the major industry sector, total private, and total nonfarm levels. 
More information about aggregating CES data is available in the 
Handbook of Methods in the Calculations section on Aggregation 
procedures, www.bls.gov/opub/hom/ces/calculation.htm#aggregation-
procedures.

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