Notice2025-05463
Agency Information Collection Activities; Submission to the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) for Review and Approval; Comment Request; Annual Business Survey
Primary source
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Published
March 31, 2025
Issuing agencies
Commerce DepartmentCensus Bureau
Full Text
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<title>Federal Register, Volume 90 Issue 60 (Monday, March 31, 2025)</title>
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[Federal Register Volume 90, Number 60 (Monday, March 31, 2025)]
[Notices]
[Pages 14231-14232]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [<a href="http://www.gpo.gov">www.gpo.gov</a>]
[FR Doc No: 2025-05463]
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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 Business 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 September 22, 2023 during a 60-day comment period.
This notice allows for an additional 30 days for public comments.
Agency: U.S. Census Bureau, Commerce.
Title: Annual Business Survey.
OMB Control Number: 0607-1004.
Form Number(s): ABS-1.
Type of Request: Regular submission, Request for a Revision of a
Currently Approved Collection.
Number of Respondents: 230,000.
Average Hours per Response: 29 minutes.
Burden Hours: 112,367.
Needs and Uses: In an effort to improve the measurement of business
dynamics in the United States, the Census Bureau is conducting the 2025
Annual Business Survey (ABS), covering reference year 2024. The ABS
combines Census Bureau firm-level collections to reduce respondent
burden, increase data quality, reduce operational costs, and operate
more efficiently. The ABS measures research and development for
microbusinesses, new business topics such as innovation and technology,
as well as other business characteristics. Further, the ABS provides
information on selected economic and demographic characteristics for
businesses and business owners by sex, ethnicity, race, and veteran
status. The 2025 ABS is co-sponsored by the National Center for Science
and Engineering Statistics (NCSES) within the National Science
Foundation (NSF) and conducted by the Census Bureau.
Estimates from the Research and Development section of the ABS are
used as a part of the calculations for investment in quarterly GDP.
The ABS includes all nonfarm employer businesses filing Internal
Revenue Service (IRS) tax forms as individual proprietorships,
partnerships, or any other type of corporation, with receipts of $1,000
or more. While the 2023 ABS sampled approximately 850,000 employer
businesses to produce detailed statistics by owner demographics, last
survey year 2024 ABS (reference year 2023), the sample was reduced to
approximately 330,000 employer businesses and 8,000 nonprofits to
reduce the burden on the respondents. For the 2025 ABS, we further
reduced the sample to 222,000 employer businesses and 8,000 nonprofits.
The reduced sample size will yield summary-level estimates by owner
characteristics at the NAICS (North American Industry Classification
System) sector level, U.S., state, metropolitan statistical area (MSA),
and county levels. The Census Bureau uses administrative data to
estimate the probability that a firm belongs in each owner
characteristic category. The universe is then stratified by employment
size, owner characteristic probability, and NAICS, with additional
minor adjustments made to reduce the chance of respondents being
selected into the sample every year thereby reducing respondent burden
especially for smaller businesses. The sample is stratified by state,
industry, and owner characteristics. The Census Bureau selects some
companies with certainty based on volume of sales, payroll, and number
of paid employees or NAICS. All certainty cases are sure to be selected
and represent only themselves.
The 2025 ABS (reference year 2024) will also sample approximately
8,000 nonprofit organizations to collect their research activities. Of
note, nonprofit organizations will only see questions relating to
research activities and will not be asked any questions relating to
owner demographics.
A summary of the changes we are implementing in the 2025 ABS
follows:
<bullet> Reduce sample size from 338,000 employer businesses and
nonprofit organizations to 230,000.
<bullet> Introduce sampling changes that decrease the chances of
respondents being selected into the survey year after year. Further,
mail out strategy changes to remove chronic nonresponders.
<bullet> Remove Telephone Follow-Up to reduce the type of contacts
we have with respondents and increase cost savings.
<bullet> Streamline content--Content removed includes questions on
work from home, sexual orientation, gender identity, business
collaboration with other entities like universities, and management
practices.
The ABS is designed to be adaptive. New content each survey year
can be incorporated based on topics of relevance. Each year, new
questions will be submitted to the Office of Management and Budget
(OMB) for approval. The ABS consists of a core set of questions that do
not change, and a variable set of questions of topical relevance which
change annually. The core questions, due to their stable nature, are
cleared every three years along with 60- and 30-day notices published
in the Federal Register. The core questions were last cleared in 2024.
The variable topical questions are submitted to the Office of
Management and Budget each year along with a 30-day notice.
Employer businesses will be asked questions about the sex,
ethnicity, race, and veteran status for up to four persons owning the
majority of rights, equity, or interest in the business. Organizations
sampled as nonprofits and respondents with 1-9 employees will be asked
about research and development (R&D) activities, R&D costs, and R&D
capital expenditures. Further, employer businesses sampled will be
asked about the following topics: Goods, Services, and Business
Processes. These sections are also known as modules. The 2025 ABS
(reference year 2024) will not contain any new or variable content. We
do plan to add variable content on Management Practices next year to
the 2026 ABS (reference year 2025).
The ABS is collected electronically using a web-based
questionnaire. Respondents selected for the survey receive an initial
letter informing them of their requirement to complete the survey as
well as instructions on accessing the survey. The 2025 ABS initial
mailing is scheduled for July 2025. Responses will be due approximately
30 days from initial mailing. Respondents will also receive a due date
reminder approximately one week before responses are due. The Census
Bureau plans to conduct two follow-up mailings and an optional third
follow-up if deemed necessary based on quality of response data at that
time. The Census Bureau may also plan to conduct an email follow-up to
select
[[Page 14232]]
nonrespondents reminding them to submit their report in the electronic
instrument. Closeout of mail operations is scheduled for December 2025
but may be extended to allow ample time to receive returned forms if
necessary. Response data will be processed as they are received. Upon
the close of the collection period, data processing will continue, and
records will be edited, reviewed, tabulated, and disseminated.
Statistics from the ABS will be used by government program
officials, industry organization leaders, economic and social analysts,
business entrepreneurs, and domestic and foreign researchers in
business, government and academia. Estimates produced on R&D and
innovation may be used to compare R&D costs across industries,
determine where R&D activity is conducted geographically, and identify
the types of businesses with R&D; to contribute to the Bureau of
Economic Analysis (BEA) system of national accounts; to increase
investments in research and development, strengthen education, and
encourage entrepreneurship; and to compare business innovation in the
United States to other countries. Results of the research activities
data collected from nonprofit organizations will be used to report
updated, valid, and reliable estimates of U.S. nonprofit R&D in
National Patterns of R&D Resources and BEA's system of national
accounts.
The data collected by ABS will also be incorporated into the
National Science Board's biennial report, Science and Engineering
Indicators (SEI). The R&D data from the nonprofit module will be
reported in periodic publications and for comparisons of R&D efforts.
NCSES also anticipates professional associations will use data from the
nonprofit module.
Additional examples of data use include:
<bullet> The National Women's Business Council to assess the state
of women's business ownership for policymakers, researchers, and the
public at large.
<bullet> Consultants and researchers to analyze long-term economic
and demographic shifts, and differences in ownership and performance
among geographic areas.
<bullet> Individual business owners to analyze their operations in
comparison to similar firms, compute their market share, and assess
their growth and future prospects.
Frequency: Annually.
Respondent's Obligation: Mandatory.
Legal Authority: Title 13, United States Code, sections 8(b), 131,
and 182; title 42, United States Code, section 1861-76 (National
Science Foundation Act of 1950, as amended); and section 505 within the
America COMPETES Reauthorization Act of 2010 authorize this collection.
Sections 224 and 225 of title 13, United States Code, require a
response from sampled firms.
This information collection request may be viewed at
<a href="http://www.reginfo.gov">www.reginfo.gov</a>. 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 <a href="http://www.reginfo.gov/public/do/PRAMain">www.reginfo.gov/public/do/PRAMain</a>.
Find this particular information collection by selecting ``Currently
under 30-day Review--Open for Public Comments'' or by using the search
function and entering either the title of the collection or the OMB
Control Number 0607-1004.
Sheleen Dumas,
Departmental PRA Compliance Officer, Office of the Under Secretary for
Economic Affairs, Commerce Department.
[FR Doc. 2025-05463 Filed 3-28-25; 8:45 am]
BILLING CODE 3510-07-P
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