Harmonized Population and Labor Force Statistics

John Coglianese, Seth Murray and Christopher Nekarda
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John Coglianese: https://www.federalreserve.gov/econres/john-m-coglianese.htm
Seth Murray: https://www.federalreserve.gov/econres/seth-m-murray.htm

No 2025-057, Finance and Economics Discussion Series from Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (U.S.)

Abstract: The official labor force statistics often exhibit discontinuities in January, when updated population estimates are incorporated into the Current Population Survey (CPS) for the current year but are not revised backward through history. We construct harmonized population estimates spanning five decades and produce new weights for the CPS microdata that are benchmarked to these estimates. Using these weights, we estimate harmonized labor force statistics that reflect the latest available information about the population and its characteristics. The harmonized labor force series are free from the discontinuities in the historical data and show a notably larger labor force shortfall in the post-pandemic period.

Keywords: Population; Labor force; Employment; Unemployment; Immigration; CPS (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: C80 E24 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 69 p.
Date: 2025-08-05
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:fip:fedgfe:2025-57

DOI: 10.17016/FEDS.2025.057

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