Agency Information Collection Activities; Submission to the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) for Review and Approval; Comment Request; Business Enterprise Research and Development Survey, 49505-49506 [2021-19134]

Download as PDF Federal Register / Vol. 86, No. 169 / Friday, September 3, 2021 / Notices MEDIAN DEPRECIATION RATES OF RURAL UTILITIES SERVICE BORROWERS BY EQUIPMENT CATEGORY FOR PERIOD ENDING DECEMBER 31, 2020 Telecommunications plant category Depreciation rate 1. Land and Support Assets: a. Motor vehicles ............... b. Aircraft ........................... c. Special purpose vehicles ................................ d. Garage and other work equipment ...................... e. Buildings ....................... f. Furniture and office equipment ...................... g. General purpose computers ............................. 2. Central Office Switching: a. Digital ............................ b. Analog & Electro-mechanical ......................... c. Operator Systems ......... 3. Central Office Transmission: a. Radio Systems .............. b. Circuit equipment .......... 4. Information origination/termination: a. Station apparatus .......... b. Customer premises wiring .................................. c. Large private branch exchanges ......................... d. Public telephone terminal equipment ............ e. Other terminal equipment ............................... 5. Cable and wire facilities: a. Aerial cable—poles ....... b. Aerial cable—metal ....... c. Aerial cable—fiber ......... d. Underground cable— metal .............................. e. Underground cable— fiber ................................ f. Buried cable—metal ...... g. Buried cable—fiber ....... h. Conduit systems ........... i. Other .............................. 18.00 11.13 12.00 10.00 3.25 10.00 20.00 10.00 10.00 10.00 10.00 10.00 12.25 10.00 11.90 12.00 10.15 6.00 6.00 5.10 5.00 5.00 5.15 5.00 4.00 5.00 Christopher McLean, Acting Administrator, Rural Utilities Service. [FR Doc. 2021–19018 Filed 9–2–21; 8:45 am] BILLING CODE 3410–15–P COMMISSION ON CIVIL RIGHTS lotter on DSK11XQN23PROD with NOTICES1 Notice of Public Meeting of the Tennessee Advisory Committee Commission on Civil Rights. Announcement of meeting. AGENCY: ACTION: Notice is hereby given, pursuant to the provisions of the rules and regulations of the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights (Commission), and the Federal Advisory Committee Act SUMMARY: VerDate Sep<11>2014 16:55 Sep 02, 2021 Jkt 253001 (FACA), that a meeting of the Tennessee Advisory Committee to the Commission will convene by conference call on Thursday, September 16, 2021, at 12:00 p.m. (CT). The purpose is to consider topics for their next project. DATES: The meeting will be held on: Thursday, September 16, 2021, 12:00 p.m. CT. Join via Webex: https:// civilrights.webex.com/civilrights/ j.php?MTID=m266086828fecf71c42 baa6329432e1c3. Join via phone: 800–360–9505 USA Toll Free; Access Code: 199 769 7332#. FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Victoria Moreno at vmoreno@usccr.gov or by phone at 434–515–0204. SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: This meeting is available to the public through the WebEx link above. If joining only via phone, callers can expect to incur charges for calls they initiate over wireless lines, and the Commission will not refund any incurred charges. Individuals who are deaf, deafblind and hard of hearing may also follow the proceedings by first calling the Federal Relay Service at 1–800–877–8339 and providing the Service with the call-in number found through registering at the web link provided above for the meeting. Members of the public are entitled to make comments during the open period at the end of the meeting. Members of the public may also submit written comments; the comments must be received in the Regional Programs Unit within 30 days following the respective meeting. Written comments may be emailed to Victoria Moreno at vmoreno@usccr.gov. All written comments received will be available to the public. Persons who desire additional information may contact the Regional Programs Unit at (202) 809–9618. Records and documents discussed during the meeting will be available for public viewing as they become available at the www.facadatabase.gov. Persons interested in the work of this advisory committee are advised to go to the Commission’s website, www.usccr.gov, or to contact the Regional Programs Unit at the above phone number or email address. Agenda: Thursday, September 16, 2021; 12:00 p.m. (CT). 1. Welcome & Roll Call 2. Chair’s Comments 3. Committee Discussion 4. Next Steps 5. Public Comment 6. Other Business 7. Adjourn PO 00000 Frm 00002 Fmt 4703 Sfmt 4703 49505 Dated: August 31, 2021. David Mussatt, Supervisory Chief, Regional Programs Unit. [FR Doc. 2021–19115 Filed 9–2–21; 8:45 am] BILLING CODE P DEPARTMENT OF COMMERCE Census Bureau Agency Information Collection Activities; Submission to the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) for Review and Approval; Comment Request; Business Enterprise Research and Development 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 June 28, 2021 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: Business Enterprise Research and Development Survey. OMB Control Number: 0607–0912. Form Number(s): BRD–1. Type of Request: Regular submission, Request for a Revision of a Currently Approved Collection. Number of Respondents: 47,500. Average Hours per Response: 2 hours and 37 minutes. Burden Hours: 124,450. Needs and Uses: The Census Bureau is requesting clearance to conduct the Business Enterprise Research and Development Survey (BERD) for the 2021–2023 survey years with the revisions outlined in this document. Companies are the major performers of research and development (R&D) in the United States, accounting for over 70 percent of total U.S. R&D expenditures each year. A consistent business R&D information base is essential to government officials formulating public policy, industry personnel involved in corporate planning, and members of the academic community conducting research. To develop policies designed to promote and enhance science and technology, past trends and the present E:\FR\FM\03SEN1.SGM 03SEN1 lotter on DSK11XQN23PROD with NOTICES1 49506 Federal Register / Vol. 86, No. 169 / Friday, September 3, 2021 / Notices status of R&D must be known and analyzed. Without comprehensive business R&D statistics, it would be impossible to evaluate the health of science and technology in the United States or to make comparisons between the technological progress of our country and that of other nations. BERD is a joint statistical project between the National Center for Science and Engineering Statistics (NCSES) within the National Science Foundation (NSF) and the Census Bureau. NCSES has published annual R&D statistics collected from the Survey of Industrial Research and Development (1953–2007), the Business R&D and Innovation Survey (2008–2016), the Business Research and Development Survey (2017 and 2018), and the Business Enterprise Research and Development Survey (2019 and 2020) for 67 years. The results of the surveys are used to assess trends in R&D expenditures by industry sector, investigate productivity determinants, formulate science and tax policy, and compare individual company performance with industry averages. This survey is the Nation’s primary source for international comparative statistics on business R&D spending. BERD will continue to collect the following types of information: • R&D expense based on accepted accounting standards. • Worldwide R&D of domestic companies. • Business segment detail. • R&D related capital expenditures. • Detailed data about the R&D workforce. • R&D strategy and data on the potential impact of R&D on the market. Beginning in 2020, in an effort to reduce burden, BERD began rotating select content off the survey in alternating years. In 2020, questions related to detail of R&D performed by others, activities with academia, industries of business and specific federal agency funding R&D, and areas of application for R&D were removed from BERD. In 2021, all of those questions will be reintroduced to the survey and the Intellectual Property and Technology Transfer Section will be removed from the survey. BERD plans to continue rotating this content in alternating years. Beginning in 2021, the BERD will revise its existing Capital Expenditures section to collect additional information on assets. Cognitive testing on these questions conducted by the Census Bureau in 2018 revealed that these questions pose no substantive impact on burden (the data requested are all readily available in most companies’ VerDate Sep<11>2014 16:55 Sep 02, 2021 Jkt 253001 books) and would provide context on capital stock of R&D active companies not currently available in any other data source. After collecting two consecutive years of data (for 2021 and 2022), BERD plans to collect the additional assets questions in alternating years, similar to the other rotating content. So, in 2023, BERD would have the smaller [previously collected] Capital Expenditures section, and in 2024 would reinstate the more robust Assets section and so on. Information from BERD will continue to support NCSES’ responsibility to collect information on Research and Development for overall support for Federal policy discussions, as required under the America COMPETES Reauthorization Act of 2010. Policy officials from many Federal agencies rely on these statistics for essential information. Businesses and trade organizations rely on BERD data to benchmark their industry’s performance against others. For example, total U.S. R&D expenditures statistics are used by the Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) for incorporating R&D as fixed investment in updates to the National Income and Product Accounts (NIPAs). Also, NCSES, BEA and the Census Bureau periodically seek to use BERD data to augment global R&D investment information that is obtained from BEA’s Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) and U.S. Direct Investment Abroad (USDIA) surveys. Further, the Census Bureau links data collected by BERD with other statistical files. At the Census Bureau, historical company-level R&D data are linked to a file that contains information on the outputs and inputs of companies’ manufacturing plants. Researchers can analyze the relationships between R&D funding and other economic variables by using micro-level data. Individuals and organizations access the survey statistics via the internet in annual InfoBriefs published by NCSES that announce the availability of statistics from each cycle of BERD and detailed statistical table reports that contain all of the statistics NCSES produces from BERD. Information about the kinds of projects that rely on statistics from BERD is available from internal records of Census’ Center for Economic Studies. In addition, survey statistics are regularly cited in trade publications and many researchers use the survey statistics from these secondary sources without directly contacting NCSES or the Census Bureau. Affected Public: Business or other forprofit organizations. Frequency: Annually. Respondent’s Obligation: Mandatory. PO 00000 Frm 00003 Fmt 4703 Sfmt 4703 Legal Authority: The survey is conducted under the authority of Title 13, United States Code, Sections 8(b), 131, and 182; Title 42, United States Code, Sections 1861–76 (National Science Foundation Act of 1950, as amended); and Section 505 within the America COMPETES Reauthorization Act of 2010. 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 either the title of the collection or the OMB Control Number 0607–0912. Sheleen Dumas, Department PRA Clearance Officer, Office of the Chief Information Officer, Commerce Department. [FR Doc. 2021–19134 Filed 9–2–21; 8:45 am] BILLING CODE 3510–07–P DEPARTMENT OF COMMERCE Census Bureau Agency Information Collection Activities; Submission to the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) for Review and Approval; Comment Request; Current Population Survey, Annual Social and Economic Supplement U.S. Census Bureau, Commerce. ACTION: Notice of information collection, request for comment. AGENCY: The Department of Commerce, in accordance with the Paperwork Reduction Act (PRA) of 1995, invites 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. The purpose of this notice is to allow for 60 days of public comment on the proposed revision of the Annual Social and Economic Supplement (ASEC) to the Current Population Survey, prior to the submission of the information collection request (ICR) to OMB for approval. SUMMARY: E:\FR\FM\03SEN1.SGM 03SEN1

Agencies

[Federal Register Volume 86, Number 169 (Friday, September 3, 2021)]
[Notices]
[Pages 49505-49506]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 2021-19134]


=======================================================================
-----------------------------------------------------------------------

DEPARTMENT OF COMMERCE

Census Bureau


Agency Information Collection Activities; Submission to the 
Office of Management and Budget (OMB) for Review and Approval; Comment 
Request; Business Enterprise Research and Development 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 June 28, 2021 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: Business Enterprise Research and Development Survey.
    OMB Control Number: 0607-0912.
    Form Number(s): BRD-1.
    Type of Request: Regular submission, Request for a Revision of a 
Currently Approved Collection.
    Number of Respondents: 47,500.
    Average Hours per Response: 2 hours and 37 minutes.
    Burden Hours: 124,450.
    Needs and Uses: The Census Bureau is requesting clearance to 
conduct the Business Enterprise Research and Development Survey (BERD) 
for the 2021-2023 survey years with the revisions outlined in this 
document. Companies are the major performers of research and 
development (R&D) in the United States, accounting for over 70 percent 
of total U.S. R&D expenditures each year. A consistent business R&D 
information base is essential to government officials formulating 
public policy, industry personnel involved in corporate planning, and 
members of the academic community conducting research. To develop 
policies designed to promote and enhance science and technology, past 
trends and the present

[[Page 49506]]

status of R&D must be known and analyzed. Without comprehensive 
business R&D statistics, it would be impossible to evaluate the health 
of science and technology in the United States or to make comparisons 
between the technological progress of our country and that of other 
nations.
    BERD is a joint statistical project between the National Center for 
Science and Engineering Statistics (NCSES) within the National Science 
Foundation (NSF) and the Census Bureau.
    NCSES has published annual R&D statistics collected from the Survey 
of Industrial Research and Development (1953-2007), the Business R&D 
and Innovation Survey (2008-2016), the Business Research and 
Development Survey (2017 and 2018), and the Business Enterprise 
Research and Development Survey (2019 and 2020) for 67 years. The 
results of the surveys are used to assess trends in R&D expenditures by 
industry sector, investigate productivity determinants, formulate 
science and tax policy, and compare individual company performance with 
industry averages. This survey is the Nation's primary source for 
international comparative statistics on business R&D spending.
    BERD will continue to collect the following types of information:
     R&D expense based on accepted accounting standards.
     Worldwide R&D of domestic companies.
     Business segment detail.
     R&D related capital expenditures.
     Detailed data about the R&D workforce.
     R&D strategy and data on the potential impact of R&D on 
the market.
    Beginning in 2020, in an effort to reduce burden, BERD began 
rotating select content off the survey in alternating years. In 2020, 
questions related to detail of R&D performed by others, activities with 
academia, industries of business and specific federal agency funding 
R&D, and areas of application for R&D were removed from BERD. In 2021, 
all of those questions will be reintroduced to the survey and the 
Intellectual Property and Technology Transfer Section will be removed 
from the survey. BERD plans to continue rotating this content in 
alternating years.
    Beginning in 2021, the BERD will revise its existing Capital 
Expenditures section to collect additional information on assets. 
Cognitive testing on these questions conducted by the Census Bureau in 
2018 revealed that these questions pose no substantive impact on burden 
(the data requested are all readily available in most companies' books) 
and would provide context on capital stock of R&D active companies not 
currently available in any other data source. After collecting two 
consecutive years of data (for 2021 and 2022), BERD plans to collect 
the additional assets questions in alternating years, similar to the 
other rotating content. So, in 2023, BERD would have the smaller 
[previously collected] Capital Expenditures section, and in 2024 would 
reinstate the more robust Assets section and so on.
    Information from BERD will continue to support NCSES' 
responsibility to collect information on Research and Development for 
overall support for Federal policy discussions, as required under the 
America COMPETES Reauthorization Act of 2010.
    Policy officials from many Federal agencies rely on these 
statistics for essential information. Businesses and trade 
organizations rely on BERD data to benchmark their industry's 
performance against others. For example, total U.S. R&D expenditures 
statistics are used by the Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) for 
incorporating R&D as fixed investment in updates to the National Income 
and Product Accounts (NIPAs). Also, NCSES, BEA and the Census Bureau 
periodically seek to use BERD data to augment global R&D investment 
information that is obtained from BEA's Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) 
and U.S. Direct Investment Abroad (USDIA) surveys. Further, the Census 
Bureau links data collected by BERD with other statistical files. At 
the Census Bureau, historical company-level R&D data are linked to a 
file that contains information on the outputs and inputs of companies' 
manufacturing plants. Researchers can analyze the relationships between 
R&D funding and other economic variables by using micro-level data.
    Individuals and organizations access the survey statistics via the 
internet in annual InfoBriefs published by NCSES that announce the 
availability of statistics from each cycle of BERD and detailed 
statistical table reports that contain all of the statistics NCSES 
produces from BERD. Information about the kinds of projects that rely 
on statistics from BERD is available from internal records of Census' 
Center for Economic Studies. In addition, survey statistics are 
regularly cited in trade publications and many researchers use the 
survey statistics from these secondary sources without directly 
contacting NCSES or the Census Bureau.
    Affected Public: Business or other for-profit organizations.
    Frequency: Annually.
    Respondent's Obligation: Mandatory.
    Legal Authority: The survey is conducted under the authority of 
Title 13, United States Code, Sections 8(b), 131, and 182; Title 42, 
United States Code, Sections 1861-76 (National Science Foundation Act 
of 1950, as amended); and Section 505 within the America COMPETES 
Reauthorization Act of 2010.
    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 either the title of the collection or the OMB 
Control Number 0607-0912.

Sheleen Dumas,
Department PRA Clearance Officer, Office of the Chief Information 
Officer, Commerce Department.
[FR Doc. 2021-19134 Filed 9-2-21; 8:45 am]
BILLING CODE 3510-07-P
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