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About Annual Survey of Manufactures

Purpose:

To provide key intercensal measures of manufacturing activity, products, and location for the public and private sectors. The ASM provides the best current measure of current U.S. manufacturing industry outputs, inputs, and operating status, and is the primary basis for updates of the Longitudinal Research Database (LRD). Census Bureau staff and academic researchers with sworn agent status use the LRD for micro data analysis.

Coverage:

Manufacturing establishments with one or more paid employees or nonemployers that use leased employees for manufacturing are classified in NAICS sector 31-33.

Content:

The ASM provides statistics on employment, payroll, worker hours, payroll supplements, cost of materials, selected operating expenses, value added by manufacturing, capital expenditures, inventories, and energy consumption. It also provides estimates of value of shipments for over 1700 classes of manufactured products.

Frequency:

The ASM is conducted annually, except for years ending in 2 and 7, at which time ASM data are included in the manufacturing sector of the Economic Census.

Methods:

The Annual Survey of Manufactures includes approximately 55,000 establishments selected from the census universe of 330,000 manufacturing establishments. Some 10,000 large establishments are selected with certainty, and some 45,000 other establishments are selected with probability proportional to a composite measure of establishment size. The survey frame is updated from two sources; Internal Revenue Service administrative records are used to include new single-unit manufacturers and the Company Organization Survey identifies new establishments of multi-unit forms.

Products:

Data is available on the Internet and on CD-ROM. The principal publications are:

Statistics for Industry Groups and Industries - displays statistics at the 6, 4, and 3-digit NAICS levels and for total manufacturing.

Value of Product Shipments - displays statistics by 7-digit product class.

Geographic Area Statistics - shows data for each state by selected 3- and 4-digit NAICS industries.

Targeted release dates are 12-18 months from the end of the reference period.

Users:

Bureau of Economic Analysis uses ASM data to prepare annual updates of the GNP and GNP weight deflators, the annual input-output (I/O) tables, and to the private inventories, producer.s equipment and software components (PES) of the gross domestic product (GDP).

Bureau of Labor Statistics uses ASM data to calculate annual productivity series, updating producer price indexes, and calculate weights when new components are added.

Federal Reserve Board uses ASM data to prepare the Index of Industrial Production.

International Trade Administration designs and evaluates the export development program, evaluates and forecasts future industrial activity.

The Census Bureau benchmarks current data on manufacturing shipments and inventories.

State and local agencies use ASM data for economic policymaking and forecasting.

Related Programs:

Economic Census: Manufacturing (includes data for years ending in "2" and "7")
Manufacturing Energy Consumption Survey
Survey of Plant Capacity Utilization
Manufacturers. Shipments, Inventories, and Orders Survey
Current Industrial Reports
E-Commerce
Survey of Industrial Research and Development (R&D)
Fuels and Electric Energy Survey
Survey of Pollution Abatement Costs and Expenditures