by Calculated Risk on 6/19/2010 01:05:00 PM

In a post last month I reviewed the impact of the decennial Census hiring on the payroll report. Here is an update ...

We can estimate the Census hiring using weekly payroll data from the Census bureau (ht Bob_in_MA). If we subtract the number of temporary 2010 Census workers in the week containing the 12th of the month, from the same week for the previous month - this provides a close estimate for the impact of the Census hiring.

The Census Bureau releases the actual number with the employment report.

Click on graph for larger image in new window.

This graph shows the number of Census workers paid each week. The red labels are the weeks of the BLS payroll survey.

So far the decennial Census payroll has decreased by 156 thousand this month, and will probably subtract 200 to 250 thousand from the payroll report (we will have a good estimate this coming Wednesday when the week ending June 12th is released).

When the employment report is released on July 2nd, a key number will be payroll jobs ex-Census (to understand the underlying trend). The headline number for June - including Census numbers - will probably be negative.