The US Department of Manpower Statistics Agency employs a part -time economist for CPI reports
The Department of Manpower Statistics Bureau, which was criticized for a recent sharp revision for US non-agricultural payroll and reduction in inflation data collection, employed around 25 part-time economists assistants, job posts showed.
The position advertised in usajobs.gov, which is spread throughout the country, is in the BLS price program division, the Consumer Price Index Program (CPI).
The Department of Manpower’s Inspector General Office said that last week they began a review of the challenges faced by statistical agents in collecting and reporting economic data.
The decrease in a sharp ranking last month to May and the June payroll figure with a total of 258,000 jobs made the anger of US President Donald Trump, who fired BLS Commissioner Erika McCentarfer, accused him, without evidence, falsifying job data. Trump has nominated Ej Antoni, the head of economist at the Think Tank Heritage Foundation, to replace Mcentarfer.
BLS has suffered from inadequate funding for many years under the Democratic and Republican government.
Like all government institutions, it has been greatly influenced by the mass shooting of Trump administration, voluntary resignation, early retirement and recruitment of freezing, part of the campaign that has never happened before by the White House to drastically reduce the size of government.
Last week, Trade Secretary Howard Lutnick in an interview with Axios, criticized the mass dismissal of federal workers Elon Musk when billionaires led the government efficiency department. BLS, whose workforce is estimated to have been reduced by around 15%, has suspended data collection for some CPI baskets in several regions throughout the country.
It also ended the calculation and publication of around 350 indexes in the producer price report.
It has led to concerns about the quality of data, including monthly labor reports that are watched carefully, the new one has become the subject of a large revision downward. US economic data has long been seen as a gold standard.
BLS uses imputation, statistical methods used by economists to estimate the values and fill out information lost in the CPI basket. The share of different cell imputation in CPI data increased to 36% in August from only 9% in August 2024.
The Department of Trade Census Bureau also employs around 46 field workers and supervisors. Field workers with census bureaus help data collection for CPI and household survey components from employment reports.
Source: Reuters
