BLS DAILY REPORT, THURSDAY, OCTOBER 12, 2000
RELEASED TODAY: The U.S. Import Price Index rose 1.5 percent in September.
The increase was attributable to a rise in petroleum import prices. The
Export Price Index increased 0.5 percent in September, following a decline
of 0.3 percent in the previous month. ...
A Bureau of Labor Statistics pilot survey shows that stock options are most
prevalent among highly paid employees of companies with publicly traded
stock. As a part of research on ways to improve compensation measures, the
stock option survey found that, among establishments of publicly held
companies, 22.1 percent offered stock options to their employees in 1999, a
much higher incidence than the 2.4 percent shown for all private
establishments. ... Now that they have estimates of the incidence of stock
options, bureau officials plan to conduct a survey on the costs of stock
options to employers, according to Kathleen MacDonald, BLS associate
commissioner for compensation and working conditions. Before they can
prepare the survey and set a timetable for its completion, BLS economists
will consult with accountants and other experts about how best to gather the
cost information, she said, adding that the agency will be able to set a
timetable for the next survey within a couple of months. When the agency
has the cost information, it can assess the impact on employers, MacDonald
said. "Remember that the ECI is an employer survey," so it is not intended
to show the direct effect of certain benefits to employees, she said. If
the agency decides that the impact of stock options on employers' costs is
significant, it could opt to start collecting data on stock options on a
regular basis for the ECI or perhaps make it a separate survey, MacDonald
said. The impact on a given establishment could be significant, for
example, even if only a relatively small number of highly paid employees
were given stock options, she said. ... (Pam Ginsbach in Daily Labor
Report, page D-1).
Confusion about how labor strikes are used in computing employment
statistics has grown significant enough to prompt the Bureau of Labor
Statistics to write a report clarifying its procedures, says Karthik Rao, an
economist at BLS' division of monthly industry employment statistics. She
said the agency has received several public inquiries about how strikes are
classified in the data, and BLS decided "it's time for someone to write an
article to clarify how we handle strike data." The report, "The Impact of
Strikes on Current Employment Statistics," was published in the agency's
"Monthly Labor Review." Rao, the author of the report, says three major
factors determine how, where, and to what extent strikes influence payroll
employment data: the reference pay period used by BLS, the industry code,
and the striking company's presence in or absence from the sample. Rao says
the most critical factor in whether a strike will be reflected in the
payroll employment data, or current employment statistics (CES) survey, is
its timing. If a strike begins or ends during the survey reference period,
which is always the pay period that includes the 12th of the month, the
workers on the payroll for that week would not be included in the payroll
employment count. ... (Daily Labor Report, page A-4; text, page E-27).
__"Given the robust nature of the economy, there is a general shortage of
people in the resort counties, here as well as nationwide," says Colorado's
state demographer, who attributes the labor problems to the rapid growth in
tourism, the increasing number of second and third homes built in ski resort
areas, and soaring real estate markets. In many of Colorado's ski towns, a
modest single family house with three or four bedrooms sells for $1 million
or more. As a result, working people who earn hourly wages selling clothes,
waiting tables, and operating ski lifts can no longer afford to live near
their jobs. In the last few years, many of them have been forced to find
affordable housing 30 to 60 miles away, creating monstrous rush-hour traffic
jams, polluting the air, and undermining the quality of life of workers,
especially those who long to spend more time with their children. Now,
workers are beginning to abandon their resort jobs to find work closer to
home. ... While the nation's unemployment rate fell to 3.9 percent in
August, matching a 30-year record, the rate fell even lower in some of
Colorado's prime ski counties: to 1.9 percent in Summit, where Copper
Mountain is; 1.5 percent in Pitkin, where Aspen is, and 1.4 percent in
Eagle, where Vail is. ... More and more employers are sending
representatives to job fairs in other states and in foreign countries,
offering recruits subsidized housing, hourly wages well above the minimum
wage, comprehensive health care packages, and free season passes to the
slopes. ... (New York Times, page A10).
Two Americans won the Nobel Price in economics for developing statistical
techniques to analyze and predict a wide range of individual choices, such
as how to get to work or whether to work at all. The Royal Swedish Academy
cited James J. Heckman, a prolific labor economist at the University of
Chicago, and Daniel L. McFadden, a highly respected econometrician at the
University of California at Berkeley. ... (Washington Post, page E3; New
York Times, page C1)_____Heckman and McFadden cited for analyzing decisions
made about lifestyles. ... (Wall Street Journal, page A2).
Expenditures for prescription drugs have more than doubled in the last 7
years, according to a graph that helps to illustrate points made in the
"Economic Scene" article by Alan B. Krueger, Bendheim Professor of Economics
and Public Affairs at Princeton University. Source of the data is the
Health Care Financial Administration, National Institute of Health Care
Management. The article itself discusses the pros and cons of various plans
to help Americans pay for health care (New York Times, page C2).
DUE OUT TOMORROW: Producer Price Indexes -- September 2000
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