Employment in IMPLAN

Deminique Heiks

November 08, 2024 20:57

INTRODUCTION

Employment is not included in the Social Accounting Matrix (SAM), but it is a valuable economic metric. That is why it is one of the four key economic indicators that IMPLAN reports economic effects for in the Project Results. In addition to the Results, users can find Employment data in the Region Details and Data Library. Employment can also be used as an Event Value alone or in combination with other values in Industry Events and Industry Impact Analysis (Detailed) Events.

DEFINING EMPLOYMENT

Employment in IMPLAN is an Industry-specific mix of full-time, part-time, and seasonal employment. It is an annual average that accounts for seasonality and follows the same definition used by the Bureau of Economic Analysis Regional Economic Accounts (BEA REA) and Bureau of Labor Statistics Census of Employment and Wages (BLS CEW) data. IMPLAN Employment is not equal to full-time equivalent (FTE) employment.

Total Employment in IMPLAN is a combination of Wage and Salary and Proprietor Employment. Wage and Salary Employment is a headcount of salaried or wage-earning employees. Proprietor Employment is a count of proprietors, partners, and tax-exempt cooperative members. Total Employment includes self-employment, all federal, state, and local government employment, and military employment (including overseas military).

IMPLAN Employment is often referred to as a headcount due to its definition of full-time/part-time annual average, adjusted for seasonality. Thus, 1 job lasting 12 months = 2 jobs lasting 6 months each = 3 jobs lasting 4 months each. A job can be either full-time or part-time. Similarly, a job that lasts one quarter of the year would be 1/4 (0.25) jobs. Note that a person can hold more than one job, so the job count is not necessarily the same as the count of employed persons.

SEASONAL EMPLOYMENT

The Output per worker relationships in IMPLAN are based on the average annual job. So if a worker works six months, they have half the annual Output and that worker will need to be entered as 0.5 jobs. To adjust the seasonal employment, take the job count times the number of months worked divided by 12. In equation form:

IMPLAN Jobs = Seasonal Jobs * [(months of seasonal job)/12]
Seasonal Jobs = IMPLAN Jobs / [(months of seasonal job)/12]

FULL-TIME EQUIVALENT EMPLOYMENT

While IMPLAN Employment adjusts for seasonality, it does not indicate the number of hours worked per day. Therefore, IMPLAN Employment is not equal to full-time equivalent (FTE) employment, so FTEs should be converted to IMPLAN jobs prior to using the value in IMPLAN. IMPLAN jobs can be converted to FTEs and vice-versa using a download in IMPLAN to FTE & Income Conversions. When converting, it helps to keep in mind that FTE jobs are always fewer in number than the equivalent part-time/full-time jobs.

The BEA calculates the number of FTE employees in each industry as follows:

FTE employees =
(total number of employees) * [(average weekly hours per employee for all
employees) / (average weekly hours per employee on full-time schedules)]

As for their determination on the number of hours for defining "employees on full-time schedules," the BEA uses BLS as a source and adopts their definition of full-time which is accounted for as anyone working 35 hours or more.

MEASURING EMPLOYMENT

Source data on Employment are inherently incomplete. Due to data disclosures and undercoverage, no one dataset provides enough information to create a complete IMPLAN database. IMPLAN’s Employment data, therefore, come from BLS Census of Employment and Wages (CEW) data, BEA Regional Economic Accounts (REA) data, and County Business Patterns (CBP) data. Learn more about the sources in Employment and Labor Income Data. For some specific Industries (farm, construction, railroad, and government) additional data sources are used that provide either more current data or more geographic or sectoral specificity.

Therefore, IMPLAN jobs include workers that are not accounted for by a number of other data sources. This often means that IMPLAN jobs are larger than many other sources report. Another reason the IMPLAN Employment may differ from other data sources is because of the BEA's rules for redefinitions. Following these rules we redefine some reported Employment, income, and production to other Industries. To learn more about this, read Redefinitions.

EMPLOYMENT IN ECONOMIC IMPACT ANALYSIS

Although Employment is not included in the Social Accounting Matrix (SAM), it is one of the four key economic indicators that IMPLAN reports economic effects for in the Project Results. Every analysis run in IMPLAN will include Employment as an economic indicator. IMPLAN uses the SAM to generate multipliers for estimating economic impacts. The SAM generates a transactions table that dictates how Industries are connected to the rest of an economy. Multipliers are measures of Industry connectivity.

The SAM traces monetary flows, so every value in the SAM is in dollars. As a non-monetary value, Employment is connected to the SAM based on its relationship to Output for a given Industry, which allows for the development of Employment multipliers. Additionally, Employment does not drive the Indirect or Induced Effects, as those are tied to dollars. Employment like other economic indicators are annual in IMPLAN, so due its definition of full-time/part-time adjusted for seasonality, the values for the Employment effects are referred to as job years, as in years of labor.

Analysts can use Employment in their Projects as an Event Value alone or in combination with other values in Industry Events and Industry Impact Analysis (Detailed) Events (IIA). It is important to keep in mind that IMPLAN uses Employment values differently when calculating the Direct Effects for those two Event Types, although both will rely on the underlying data to fill in any values not provided for each of the Industry’s Leontief Production Function components. If Total Employment is the only value provided by a user, the Direct Effects for the two Event Types will match, but only when the Group Data Year matches the Dollar Year. However, if an additional value is included in the Event, such as Output, or the Group Data and Dollar Year do not match, the Direct Effects will not match. This is because the two Event Types prioritize Event Values in a different order and use different deflators for the various components of Output. IIA Events prioritize Employment Values, where an Industry Event will not use the Employment Value to calculate the Direct Effects if any other Event Value is provided. Additionally, Industry Events only use Industry deflators, whereas IIA Events use Industry deflators for Output and Intermediate Inputs and Value Added deflators for the Value Added components. To learn more about how these Event Types calculate Direct Effects, read Industry Events and Industry Impact Analysis (Detailed) Events.

In addition to the Employment effects, the Results Page includes Occupation Impact dashboards that show details for the Occupations, Wages, and Core Competencies that accompany a specific impact or contribution. Users can also access Occupation data in the Region Details and Data Library. Occupation data is reported for the Wage and Salary Employment component of Total Employment only, so Proprietors are excluded from Occupation data. For more information, read Using Occupation Data in IMPLAN.