Current Employment Statistics Preliminary Benchmark (National) Summary

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.

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