Submitting articles to Monthly Labor Review for non-BLS authors

Monthly Labor Review (MLR) serves as the flagship publication of the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS). It publishes research, analysis, and data on the major BLS program areas: employment and unemployment; compensation and working conditions; productivity and technology; occupational safety and health; industry, occupational, and employment projections; and prices and living conditions. All articles submitted to the MLR must contain original and factual analyses not published elsewhere. Authors must explain the subject matter with clarity, accuracy, and adherence to scientific methods of data collection and analysis.

Guidelines to writing an MLR article

Articles can be submitted for consideration by email to mlr@bls.gov.

Articles must describe, explain, update, and inform the MLR’s audience about analyses and findings relevant to the major BLS program areas. Manuscripts vary in length and may contain tables, charts, appendixes, and a reference list.

Articles submitted for publication must follow these formatting styles:

• The author’s title, affiliation, and email address must be included on the first page of the article, followed by an abstract.

• Articles must be submitted electronically using a Microsoft Word document for the text and a Microsoft Excel file for the charts and tables. Each chart or table must be properly referenced—but not embedded—in the text.

• An individual data table must be submitted for each chart. Charts and tables must be submitted in the simplest format—that is, no shading, 3D effects, etc.

• Sources must be formatted as endnotes and not footnotes.

• Authors are responsible for the accuracy of their data and sources.

Three-step review process

All article submissions from outside BLS are subject to a rigorous, three-step review process. This entire process takes approximately 4 to 6 months.

Step 1: Initial review

Article submissions are screened by the MLR’s senior editorial staff for relevance of the topic to our readers and editorial problems that might arise if the submission is accepted. Authors are notified whether their article has been conditionally accepted or rejected. If conditionally accepted, the article is transitioned to peer review.

Step 2: Peer review

Article submissions conditionally accepted by the MLR’s senior editorial staff are then screened by subject-matter experts at BLS for accuracy of content, quality of analysis, and sound methodology. These experts are generally advanced degree economists with substantial experience in the relevant BLS data. The subject-matter experts provide guidance to MLR staff regarding whether the submission should be rejected or accepted for editorial review. If accepted for editorial review, the recommended revisions from the peer review are returned to the author(s). It is at the discretion of the author(s) whether they decide to resubmit their article or not to proceed toward publication. If a revised article is resubmitted with the appropriate revisions, the article is transitioned to editorial review.

Step 3: Editorial review

The editorial review process includes the following:

1.     Editorial staff review for appropriate style, tone, grammar, spelling, punctuation, consistency, accuracy, and level of discourse for our readers.

2.     Editorial staff coordinate and negotiate edits with the author(s) until they agree upon a final, revised version.

3.     Editorial staff prepare the article in HTML format and send a preview in PDF format to the author(s) for final approval.

4.     The article is published on the Monthly Labor Review homepage.

Questions or comments

Questions or comments can be addressed to mlr@bls.gov.