[Federal Register Volume 88, Number 208 (Monday, October 30, 2023)]
[Notices]
[Pages 74147-74149]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 2023-23908]


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DEPARTMENT OF COMMERCE

Census Bureau


Agency Information Collection Activities; Submission to the 
Office of Management and Budget (OMB) for Review and Approval; Comment 
Request; Annual Integrated Economic Survey

    The Department of Commerce will submit the following information 
collection request to the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) for 
review and clearance in accordance with the Paperwork Reduction Act of 
1995, on or after the date of publication of this notice. We invite the 
general public and other Federal agencies to comment on proposed, and 
continuing information collections, which helps us assess the impact of 
our information collection requirements and minimize the public's 
reporting burden. Public comments were previously requested via the 
Federal Register on November 21, 2022, during a 60-day comment period. 
This notice allows for an additional 30 days for public comments.
    Agency: U.S. Census Bureau, Department of Commerce.
    Title: Annual Integrated Economic Survey (AIES).
    OMB Control Number: 0607-1024.
    Form Number(s): This electronic collection has no form number.
    Type of Request: Regular submission, Revision of a currently 
approved collection.
    Number of Respondents: Dress Rehearsal--8,470 and 50 debriefing 
interviews; Full AIES--384,940.
    Average Hours per Response: Dress Rehearsal--3 hours and 55 
minutes, Debriefing interviews--1 hour; Full AIES--3 hours and 23 
minutes.
    Burden Hours: Dress Rehearsal--33,206 hours, Debriefing 
interviews--50 hours; Full AIES--1,300,535 hours.
    Needs and Uses: On June 21, 2023, The Office of Management and 
Budget granted approval of a Dress Rehearsal for the AIES, with the 
stipulation that the Census Bureau will submit a revision request 
documenting any changes to the forms or procedures prior to 
implementing a full scale AIES. This revision request documents the 
modifications that transpired between the U.S. Census Bureau obtaining 
that OMB clearance and the present moment.
    The U.S. Census Bureau requests Office of Management and Budget 
(OMB) approval to conduct the Annual Integrated Economic Survey (AIES) 
on an annual basis, beginning for survey year 2023 (collected in 
calendar year 2024) and a preparatory Dress Rehearsal for the AIES for 
survey year 2022 (collected in calendar year 2023). The AIES is a new 
survey designed to integrate and replace seven existing annual business 
surveys into one survey. The AIES will provide the only comprehensive 
national and subnational data on business revenues, expenses, and 
assets on an annual basis. The AIES is designed to combine Cenlong-
termu collections to reduce respondent burden, increase data quality, 
and allow the Census Bureau to operate more efficiently to reduce long 
term costs. The existing collections integrated into the AIES are the 
Annual Retail Trade Survey (ARTS), Annual Wholesale Trade Survey 
(AWTS), Service Annual Survey (SAS), Annual Survey of Manufactures 
(ASM), Annual Capital Expenditures Survey (ACES), Manufacturers' 
Unfilled Orders Survey (M3UFO), and the Report of Organization.
    The AIES will collect the following information from employer 
businesses in sample:
     Business characteristics, including employment, operating 
status, organizational change, ownership information, and co-op status.
     Business classification, including business activity, type 
of operation, and tax status.
     Revenue, including sales, shipments, and receipts, revenue 
by class of customer, taxes, contributions, gifts, and grants, 
products, and e-commerce activity.
     Operating expenses, including purchased services, payroll, 
benefits, rental payments, utilities, interest, resales, equipment, 
materials and supplies, research and development, and other detailed 
operating expenses.
     Assets, including capital expenditures, inventories, and 
depreciable assets.
     Robotic equipment expenditures and usage.
    Additional topics of collections in the AIES include sources of 
revenue and/or expense for providers (e.g., hospitals and other 
businesses in the health industry) of select services such as inpatient 
days, outpatient visits to hospitals, patient visits for other selected 
health industries, revenue from telemedicine services, and expenses for 
electronic health records. Product data will be collected from 
businesses operating in manufacturing industries. Merchandise lines 
data will be collected from businesses operating in select retail 
industries. Detailed inventories will be collected for select 
businesses operating in transportation services industries (e.g., 
trucks, truck tractors, and trailers).
    The AIES may include new questions each year based on relevant 
business topics. Potential topics for such new questions could include 
technological advances, management and business practices, export 
practices, and globalization. Any new questions will be submitted to 
OMB for review using the appropriate clearance vehicle.
    In September of 2023, the Census Bureau began conducting a Dress 
Rehearsal for the AIES with approximately 8,470 companies. The Dress 
Rehearsal will collect survey year 2022 information. The Dress 
Rehearsal will be a large-scale test of the forms and procedures 
planned for the AIES. The burden estimate is 3 hours and 55 minutes per 
respondent. The Dress rehearsal will allow us to examine patterns of 
non-response and to determine what additional support respondents will 
need. Paradata gathered from respondents' interactions with the online 
collection instrument during the Dress Rehearsal will help refine our 
burden estimate. We will also compare the quality of responses received 
to historical data collected in the 7 surveys the AIES will replace. Up 
to 50, 1-hour debriefing interviews with respondents will also be 
conducted.
    To minimize the burden imposed on most respondents already in 
sample for the seven annual surveys the AIES will replace, we will use 
the AIES responses from companies that participate in the Dress 
Rehearsal to satisfy their reporting requirement for the annual 
survey(s) for

[[Page 74148]]

which they are in sample for the 2022 survey year. Given that the AIES 
Dress Rehearsal will be conducted during the same calendar year as we 
will be conducting the 2022 Economic Census, we may use the AIES Dress 
Rehearsal to supplement Economic Census responses, pursuant to Title 13 
U.S.C., Section 193.
    After conclusion of the Dress Rehearsal, and based on refinements 
made to forms and procedures, the Census Bureau will begin conducting 
the full-scale AIES in 2024, collecting survey year 2023 information. 
The target population of the AIES includes all domestic, private 
sector, non-farm employer businesses in the United States (50 states 
and the District of Columbia) as defined by the 2017 North American 
Industry Classification System (NAICS). Exclusions are foreign 
operations of U.S. businesses headquartered in the U.S. territories and 
most government operations (including the U.S. Postal Service), 
agricultural production companies and private households. Based on this 
target population, the AIES will select a stratified sequential random 
sample of approximately 384,940 companies from a frame of approximately 
5.4 million companies constructed from the BR, which is the Census 
Bureau's master business list. Businesses which reported business 
activity on Internal Revenue Service (IRS) tax forms 941, ``Employer's 
Quarterly Federal Tax Return''; 944, ``Employer's Annual Federal Tax 
Return''; 1065 ``U.S. Return of Partnership Income''; or any one of the 
1120 corporate tax forms will be eligible for selection.
    The AIES will collect company, industry, and establishment 
information for all sampled enterprises with one or more operating 
locations in the United States and the District of Columbia (DC).
    In an effort to provide a holistic company view and replace the 
functions of the Report of Organization Survey with the AIES to 
maintain and update the BR as a master list of businesses, the AIES 
will also collect limited company, industry, and establishment 
information for select enterprises with one or more operating locations 
in associated offshore areas (referred to, collectively, as 
``Stateside'') as well as in the U.S. territories of Puerto Rico, Guam, 
the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands, the U.S. Virgin 
Islands, and American Samoa (referred to, collectively, as ``Island 
Areas''). In addition, any international locations of select 
enterprises are included if they have U.S. employees.
    The public administration sector (NAICS 92), agriculture production 
activities (NAICS 111, 112), the postal service (NAICS 491), funds and 
trusts (NAICS 525), offices of notaries (NAICS 54112), and private 
households (NAICS 814) are considered to be out-of-scope to the AIES 
program. Activities for establishments in these industries belonging to 
sampled enterprises will also be collected. Enterprises that are 
exclusively engaged in these industries will not be selected.
    Non-employer businesses are also not within the scope of this new 
AIES. The Census Bureau will submit a separate request for approval to 
collect data from non-employer businesses, if it is determined that a 
collection is needed to produce those estimates.
    Respondents will receive an email and/or letter notifying them of 
their requirement to respond and how to access the survey. Responses 
will be due approximately 30 days from receipt. Select businesses will 
receive a due date reminder via a letter or email prior to the due 
date. Additionally, email follow-ups and up to three mail follow-ups to 
nonrespondents will be conducted at approximately one-month intervals. 
Selected nonrespondents will receive a priority class mailing for the 
third follow-up if needed. Selected nonrespondents will also receive 
follow-up telephone calls.
    The AIES will replace the ARTS, AWTS, SAS, ASM, ACES, M3UFO, and 
the Report of Organization for survey year 2023, at which time the 
Census Bureau will officially sunset these programs. The ASM and the 
Report of Organization completed their final year of data collection in 
survey year 2021. ACES, ARTS, AWTS, SAS, and M3UFO will complete their 
final year of data collection in survey year 2022.
    Estimates currently published in ARTS, AWTS, SAS, ASM, and ACES 
will be produced as part of the AIES and expanded to include 
subnational data across the economy. Previously, the ASM 
(manufacturing) was the only annual survey being integrated into the 
AIES that produced subnational data. The AIES will produce subnational 
data for manufacturing, retail, wholesale, and service sectors if 
quality standards are met. The AIES information previously collected on 
the Report of Organization will continue to be used to update the 
Census Bureau's BR, and the AIES data previously collected on the M3UFO 
will continue to be used for the Manufacturers' Shipments, Inventories, 
and Orders (M3) Survey benchmarking purposes. Data users will be able 
to access the AIES estimates through the use of visualizations, CSV 
files, data.census.gov, and the Federal Reserve Economic Data (FRED), 
which is an online database maintained by the Federal Reserve Bank of 
St. Louis.
    Private businesses, organizations, industry analysts, educators and 
students, and economic researchers have used the data and estimates 
provided by the ARTS, AWTS, SAS, ASM, and ACES collections for 
analyzing and conducting impact evaluations on past and current 
economic performance, short-term economic forecasts, productivity, 
long-term economic growth, market analysis, tax policy, capacity 
utilization, business fixed capital stocks and capital formation, 
domestic and international competitiveness trade policy, product 
development, market research, and financial analysis. Trade and 
professional organizations have used the estimates to analyze industry 
trends and benchmark their own statistical programs, develop forecasts, 
and evaluate regulatory requirements. Government program officials and 
agencies have used the data for research, economic policy making, and 
forecasting.
    Based on the use of the data of the existing collections, estimates 
produced from the AIES will serve as a benchmark for Census Bureau 
indicator programs, such as the Advance Monthly Sales for Retail and 
Food Services (MARTS), the Monthly Retail Trade Survey (MRTS), 
Manufacturers' Shipments Inventories & Orders (M3), Monthly Wholesale 
Trade Survey (MWTS), and the Quarterly Services Survey (QSS). Like the 
previous collections, the AIES will provide updates to the Longitudinal 
Research Database (LRD), and Census Bureau staff and academic 
researchers with special sworn status will continue to use the LRD for 
micro data analysis. The Census Bureau will also continue to use 
information collected in the AIES to update and maintain the 
centralized, multipurpose BR that provides sampling populations and 
enumeration lists for the Census Bureau's economic surveys and 
censuses.
    The Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) will continue to use the 
estimates to derive industry output for the input-output accounts and 
for the gross domestic product (GDP). The Bureau of Labor Statistics 
(BLS) will continue to use the data as input to its Producer Price 
Index (PPI) and in developing productivity measurements; the Federal 
Reserve Board (FRB) will continue to use the data to prepare the Index 
of Industrial Production, to improve estimates of investment indicators 
for monetary policy, and in monitoring retail credit lending; the 
Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) will continue to use 
the data to estimate

[[Page 74149]]

expenditures for the National Health Accounts and for monitoring and 
evaluating healthcare industries; and the Department of the Treasury 
will continue to use the data to analyze depreciation and to research 
economic trends.
    Frequency: Annually.
    Respondent's Obligation: Mandatory.
    Legal Authority: The AIES collection is authorized by title 13 
U.S.C. 131, 182, and 193. Response to the AIES is mandatory per 
sections 224 and 225 of title 13, U.S.C.
    This information collection request may be viewed at 
www.reginfo.gov. Follow the instructions to view the Department of 
Commerce collections currently under review by OMB.
    Written comments and recommendations for the proposed information 
collection should be submitted within 30 days of the publication of 
this notice on the following website www.reginfo.gov/public/do/PRAMain. 
Find this particular information collection by selecting ``Currently 
under 30-day Review--Open for Public Comments'' or by using the search 
function and entering the title of the collection.

Sheleen Dumas,
Department PRA Clearance Officer, Office of the Under Secretary for 
Economic Affairs, Commerce Department.
[FR Doc. 2023-23908 Filed 10-27-23; 8:45 am]
BILLING CODE 3510-07-P