The U.S. Census Bureau has released new data from the Business Trends and Outlook Survey (BTOS), which measures business conditions and projections across the United States. The BTOS collects information on revenues, employees, hours, and inventories for employer businesses, excluding farms.
The survey is designed to provide timely economic data every two weeks. It covers all sectors of the economy except agriculture and includes multiunit or multilocation businesses. According to the Census Bureau, “BTOS provides insight into the state of the economy by providing continuous, timely data for key economic measures every two weeks. By providing continuous data with geographic and subsector detail, BTOS captures the impact of events like natural disasters and economic crises and assists in monitoring recovery efforts.”
Approximately 1.2 million businesses are part of the BTOS sample. These are divided into six panels of about 200,000 cases each; each panel reports every 12 weeks over a year. The agency estimates that it takes respondents around nine minutes to complete the survey.
Survey results will be published biweekly and made available by sector, state, and for the 25 most populous metropolitan statistical areas. The Census Bureau notes that these results help officials at all levels make informed policy decisions and assist businesses in their own planning: “Survey results give local, state and federal officials essential, real-time data to aid in policymaking and decision-making. In addition, the information aids businesses in making economic decisions.”
There is no accompanying news release for this announcement; only a tip sheet was provided.
