Note to Reviewer - Panel 3 Revised

Note to Reviewer of 1220-0182

The 2010 Congressional Appropriation tasked the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) Occupational Employment Statistics (OES) program with producing occupational employment and wage data on green jobs. This initiative will produce tabulations of occupational employment and wages in businesses that use green technologies and practices in their operations, as defined by BLS. 

The Office of Management and Budget (OMB) approved a clearance for the Occupational Employment Survey Forms Design and Pilot Testing for the BLS Green Practices and Processes Project through a Notice of Action, dated December 7, 2010. The purpose of that request for clearance was for the OES program to initiate a research project to understand the collection environment and learn what information establishments have available that would help BLS collect data on employment related to green technologies and practices within establishments. As part of that approved information collection, BLS agreed to submit changes in the pre-testing materials to OMB through a non-substantive change request. This request provides those updated materials.

The research project plan includes data collection forms design, panel testing, and follow-up interviews. Updates to the materials are outlined below.

• Data collection forms design - BLS plans to test multiple variations of a form during this research project.

The third panel’s form has been updated based on preliminary testing results from the first panel.

Data collection strategies now include a faxable form that can be faxed or emailed to a willing respondent once telephone contact has been made, and can be faxed back in a relatively short period of time.

• Updated Respondent’s Response Analysis Survey

The third panel’s RAS has been redesigned to be a more open-ended interview to better assess respondents’ understanding of the survey instructions, questions, and their attitudes concerning the subject matter.