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Bureau of Labor Statistics > Geographic Information > Western > Factsheet

Resources for Technology Industry Leaders

Evolving technologies expand our economy. Capturing technological changes is important to the BLS mission of providing current, gold-standard economic data to support decision making. As an industry leader, you understand that businesses need reliable measures of current economic conditions. Below are some of the useful resources and tools BLS has to offer you.

 

Data Retrieval and Applications

Retrieve all types of BLS data, view our most requested statistics or create your own table. By using the green icon for the One Screen data tool you can select the type of data you want to pull from the database. Once you have selected your data, you can adjust the timeframe and formatting.

A variety of charts and applications are available. Maps and occupational profiles show data such as wages by occupation and area. News release charts help you see important trends in the labor market and economy more clearly. In addition, BLS publications provide analysis of our data.

Map of annual mean wages for software developers in the United States, May 2024.

Selected BLS products and their uses:

Consumer Price Index (CPI): The CPI represents changes in prices of all goods and services purchased for consumption by urban households.

  • The most widely used measure of inflation, CPI data are used by governments, business executives, labor leaders, and other private citizens as a guide in making economic decisions. As a deflator of other economic series, the CPI and its components are used to adjust for price change.
  • The computers, peripherals, and smart home assistant devices index is a component of the information technology, hardware, and services category.

Import and Export Price Indexes (MXP): The U.S. Import and U.S. Export Price Indexes measure the change over time in the prices of goods or services purchased from abroad by U.S. residents (imports) or sold to foreign buyers by U.S. residents (exports).

  • The Import and Export Price Indexes are a valuable input into the processes of measuring inflation, formulating fiscal and monetary policy, forecasting future prices, conducting elasticity studies, negotiating trade contracts, and measuring U.S. industrial competitiveness. The MXP indexes are also valuable in analyzing exchange rates, import prices by locality of origin, export prices by locality of destination, and U.S. terms of trade with select trade partners.
  • Computer and electronic product manufacturing is a top export in the state of California. For more information, see California: Price Movements of Top Exports and Other Highlights.

Producer Price Indexes (PPI): The PPI is a family of indexes that measures the average change over time in selling prices received by domestic producers of goods and services.

  • PPIs measure price change from the perspective of the seller. This contrasts with other measures, such as the CPI, that measure price change from the purchaser's perspective. Producer Price Index data are widely used by the business community as well as by government. Three major uses are: as an economic indicator, a deflator of other economic series, and as the basis for contract adjustment.
  • The Producer Price Index for the data processing and related services industry measures price change for the provision of electronic data processing services. In the broadest sense, computer services companies help their customers efficiently use technology.

Employment Cost Index (ECI): The ECI provides data on how labor costs are changing and how the economy is performing. The ECI measures changes in labor costs by tracking the cost of employees to employers.

  • The ECI can be used for examining changes in compensation over time. Data are used for a variety of reasons by both the private and public sectors. Examples of uses include: military pay adjustments, federal pay adjustments, Medicare reimbursement adjustments, contract escalator clauses, labor cost adjustments, and collective bargaining negotiations.
  • The ECI quarterly news release provides the latest changes in total compensation, wages and salaries, and benefits for various occupational groups and industries, including the information sector.

Labor and Total Factor Productivity: Productivity and related cost measures are designed for use in economic analysis and public and private decision making. Productivity captures how efficiently inputs are converted into outputs of goods and services. 

  • Productivity data are used to forecast and analyze changes in prices, wages, and technology. There are two primary types of productivity statistics: labor productivity, which compares the growth in output to the growth in hours worked, and total factor productivity, which compares the growth in output to the growth in a combination of inputs that include labor, capital, energy, materials, and services.

Occupational Requirements Survey (ORS): The ORS provides job-related information regarding physical demands; environmental conditions; education, training, and experience; as well as cognitive and mental requirements for jobs in the U.S. economy.

Survey Participation and Confidentiality

Why is your participation so important?

We carefully design our survey samples to represent the people and businesses in the United States. Without your participation, these surveys would not accurately reflect the economic and social conditions in our country. We know how important your time is, so we strive to make completing our surveys as effortless as possible. We design survey questions that are easy to understand and answer in a short period of time. Nearly all of our surveys are voluntary, which means the individuals, households, and organizations selected for our survey samples can choose whether to participate. We are grateful that the great majority of them agree to participate, and we hope you will, too. The information you provide benefits all of us. This letter from Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell underscores the importance of BLS data.

How we protect your confidentiality

We understand that confidentiality is important to you. The law and our own security policies strictly protect your confidentiality to ensure no one will be able to misuse your information or gain an unfair advantage by getting inside information about your business. Federal law prohibits us from releasing any information that could reveal the identity of you or your business without your consent. The information you provide can only be used to produce statistics. In other words, it can only be used to describe or analyze the characteristics of groups—not individuals, households, or specific organizations. Protecting your information is critically important to us. Our computer systems and records have multiple layers of protection. We ensure that BLS staff stays current on policies to protect your information, and we regularly train our staff on data security.

Resources & Publications

Occupational Outlook Handbook

The Occupational Outlook Handbook (OOH) provides information on what workers do; the work environment; education, training, and other qualifications; pay; the job outlook; information on state and area data; similar occupations; and sources of additional information for more than 300 occupational profiles covering about 4 out of 5 jobs in the economy.

Spotlight on Statistics

Beyond the Numbers

Monthly Labor Review

Career Outlook

Additional Resources

Additional Tools

Occupations by Education Level and Projected Growth

The "Search by Education" option will help you find which occupations typically need a certain level of education for entry. The "Search by Occupation" option allows you to compare over 700 occupations by employment size, projected employment growth, wages, and the typical entry-level education.

Occupational Employment Projections Data

BLS publishes projections of employment by industry and occupation, as well as projections of occupational separations.

Occupational Profiles

Occupational profiles can help you determine where certain occupations are prevalent and how much you might expect workers to get paid for those occupations in different areas and industries.

At a Glance

The At a Glance pages give an economic overview of the U.S., areas throughout the country, and industries by compiling BLS data on these subjects.

BLS Handbook of Methods

The Handbook includes detailed explanations of how the data we publish are calculated.

Last modified date: April 21, 2025