Agency Information Collection Activities: Extension Without Change of An Existing Collection; Comment Request, 646-647 [2024-31755]

Agencies

• Equal Employment Opportunity Commission

[Federal Register Volume 90, Number 3 (Monday, January 6, 2025)]
[Notices]
[Pages 646-647]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 2024-31755]


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EQUAL EMPLOYMENT OPPORTUNITY COMMISSION


Agency Information Collection Activities: Extension Without 
Change of An Existing Collection; Comment Request

AGENCY: Equal Employment Opportunity Commission.

ACTION: Final notice of information collection--Uniform Guidelines on 
Employee Selection Procedures--extension without change.

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SUMMARY: In accordance with the Paperwork Reduction Act of 1995, the 
Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC or Commission) announces 
that it has submitted the information described below to the Office of 
Management and Budget (OMB) for a three-year extension without change.

DATES: Written comments on this notice must be submitted on or before 
February 5, 2025.

ADDRESSES: Written comments should be sent within 30 days of 
publication of this final notice to 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.

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Gary Hozempa, Senior Attorney, at 
(202) 921-2672 or [email protected]. Requests for this notice in an 
alternative format should be made to the Office of Communications and 
Legislative Affairs at (202) 921-3191 (voice), (800) 669-6820 (TTY), or 
(844) 234-5122 (ASL Video Phone).

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: 

Overview of Current Information Collection

    Collection Title: Recordkeeping Requirements of the Uniform 
Guidelines on Employee Selection Procedures, 29 CFR part 1607, 41 CFR 
part 60-3, 28 CFR part 50, 5 CFR part 300.
    OMB Number: 3046-0017.
    Type of Respondent: Businesses or other institutions; Federal 
Government; State or local governments and farms.
    North American Industry Classification System (NAICS) Code: 
Multiple.
    Standard Industrial Classification Code (SIC): Multiple.
    Description of Affected Public: Any employer, Government 
contractor, labor organization, or employment agency covered by the 
Federal equal employment opportunity laws.
    Respondents: 887,869.
    Responses: 887,869.
    Recordkeeping Hours: 15,422,941 per year.
    Number of Forms: None.
    Form Number: None.
    Frequency of Report: None.
    Abstract: The Uniform Guidelines provide fundamental guidance for 
all title VII-covered employers about the use of employment selection 
procedures. The records addressed by UGESP are used by respondents to 
ensure that they are complying with title VII and Executive Order 
11246; by the Federal agencies that enforce title VII and Executive 
Order 11246 to investigate, conciliate, and litigate charges of 
employment discrimination; and by complainants to establish violations 
of Federal equal employment opportunity laws. While there is no data 
available to quantify these benefits, the collection of accurate 
applicant flow data enhances each employer's ability to address 
deficiencies in recruitment and selection processes, including 
detecting barriers to equal employment opportunity.
    On October 29, 2024, the Commission published a 60-Day Notice 
informing the public of its intent to request an extension without 
change of the information collection requirements from the Office of 
Management and Budget (89 FR 85963 (October 29, 2024). Public comments 
were solicited. None were submitted as of the December 30, 2024 
deadline for filing.
    Burden Statement: There are no reporting requirements associated 
with UGESP. The burden being estimated is the cost of collecting and 
storing a job applicant's gender, race, and ethnicity data.
    The only paperwork burden derives from this recordkeeping. Only

[[Page 647]]

employers covered under title VII and Executive Order 11246 are subject 
to UGESP. However, for the purposes of burden calculation, data for all 
employers are counted.\1\ The number of employers with 15 or more 
employees is estimated at 887,869 which combines estimates from private 
employment,\2\ the public sector,\3\ colleges and universities,\4\ 
apprenticeship programs,\5\ and referral unions.\6\ Employers with 15 
or more employees represent approximately 13.5% of all employers in the 
U.S. and employ about 86.2% of all employees in the U.S.\7\
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    \1\ In calculating burden, data from multiple sources are used. 
Some of these sources do not allow us to identify only those 
employers who are covered by Title VII (employers with 15 or more 
employees).
    \2\ Source of original data: U.S Census Bureau, 2021 Statistics 
of U.S. Businesses (SUSB) (Dec. 2023). (https://www.census.gov/data/tables/2021/econ/susb/2021-susb-annual.html). Local Downloadable CSV 
data. Select U.S. & states, 6 digit NAICS. The original number of 
employers was adjusted to only include those with 15 or more 
employees.
    \3\ Source of original data: 2022 Census of Governments: 
Employment. Individual Government Data File (https://www.census.gov/data/datasets/2022/econ/apes/2022.html), Local Downloadable Data zip 
file ``Individual Unit Files''. The original number of government 
entities was adjusted to only include those with 15 or more 
employees.
    \4\ Source: U.S. Department of Education, National Center for 
Education Statistics, IPEDS, Fall 2022, Institutional 
Characteristics component (provisional data). See Table 1, ``Number 
and percentage distribution of Title IV institutions, by control of 
institution, level of institution, and region: United States and 
other U.S. jurisdictions, academic year 2022-23'' (https://nces.ed.gov/ipeds/search/viewtable?tableId=35945&returnUrl=%2Fsearch).
    \5\ Source: U.S. Department of Labor, Registered Apprenticeship 
National Results Fiscal Year 2021, Number of active apprenticeship 
programs in 2021 (https://www.dol.gov/agencies/eta/apprenticeship/about/statistics/2021).
    \6\ The EEOC has undertaken measures to enhance the agency's 
existing EEO-3 data frame (i.e., roster) of potentially eligible 
filers that was most recently used during the 2022 EEO-3 data 
collection. The number of referral unions was estimated by comparing 
the EEOC's 2022 EEO-3 frame to a list of active unions from the U.S. 
Department of Labor's Office of Labor Management Standards (OLMS) 
Online Public Disclosure Room (OPDR) database (https://olmsapps.dol.gov/olpdr/).
    \7\ Source of original data: U.S Census Bureau, 2021 Statistics 
of U.S. Businesses (SUSB) (Dec. 2023). (https://www.census.gov/data/tables/2021/econ/susb/2021-susb-annual.html). Local Downloadable CSV 
data. Select U.S. & states, 6 digit NAICS. The original number of 
employers was adjusted to only include those with 15 or more 
employees.
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    This burden assessment is based on an estimate of the number of job 
applications submitted to all employers in one year, including paper-
based and electronic applications. The total number of job applications 
submitted every year to covered employers is estimated to be 
1,850,752,956 based on an average of approximately 26 applications \8\ 
for every hire and a Bureau of Labor Statistics data estimate of 
71,046,000 annual hires.\9\ This figure also includes 136,806 
applicants for union membership reported on the EEO-3 form for 2022. 
The employer burden associated with collecting and storing applicant 
demographic data is based on the following assumptions: applicants 
would need to be asked to provide three pieces of information--sex, 
race/ethnicity, and an identification number (a total of approximately 
13 keystrokes); the employer may need to transfer information received 
to a database either manually or electronically; and the employer would 
need to store the 13 characters of information for each applicant. 
Recordkeeping costs and burden are assumed to be the time cost 
associated with entering 13 keystrokes.
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    \8\ The average number of applicants per job opening in 2023, 
according to the iCIMS 2024 January Workforce Report (https://icims.drift.click/January-2024-Workforce-Report).
    \9\ Bureau of Labor Statistics Job Openings and Labor Turnover 
Survey, 2023 annual level data (seasonally adjusted), (https://www.bls.gov/jlt/data.htm) is the source of the original data. The 
BLS figure includes new hires in both the public and the private 
sectors across all employer sizes.
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    Assuming that the required recordkeeping takes 30 seconds per 
record, and assuming a total of 1,850,752,956 paper and electronic 
applications per year (as calculated above), the resulting UGESP burden 
hours would be 15,422,941. Based on a wage rate of $22.94 \10\ per hour 
for the individuals entering the data, the collection and storage of 
applicant demographic data would come to approximately $353,802,267 per 
year. The foregoing assumptions likely are over-inclusive because many 
employers have electronic job application processes that should be able 
to capture applicant flow data automatically. While the burden hours 
and costs for the UGESP recordkeeping requirement seem large, the 
average burden per employer is relatively small. UGESP applies to an 
estimated 887,869 employers, or about 13.5% of employers in the U.S, 
and these employers employ about 86.2% of employees in the U.S.\11\ 
Therefore, the estimated cost per covered employer is about $398. 
Additionally, 36.4% of employees work for firms with at least 5,000 
employees,\12\ for which the burden of data entry is transferred to the 
applicants via use of electronic application systems. Finally, UGESP 
allows for simplified recordkeeping for employers with more than 15 but 
less than 100 employees.\13\
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    \10\ Burden hour cost estimates are based on the median hourly 
wage rate of $22.94 for Human Resources Assistants, except payroll 
and timekeeping obtained from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, May 
2023 (see U.S. Department of Labor, Bureau of Labor Statistics, 
Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics, https://www.bls.gov/oes/current/oes434161.htm).
    \11\ Source of original data: U.S Census Bureau, 2021 Statistics 
of U.S. Businesses (SUSB) (Dec. 2023). (https://www.census.gov/data/tables/2021/econ/susb/2021-susb-annual.html). Local Downloadable CSV 
data. Select U.S. & states, 6 digit NAICS. The original number of 
employers was adjusted to only include those with 15 or more 
employees.
    \12\ Source of original data: 2021 Economic Census. (https://www.census.gov/data/tables/2021/econ/susb/2021-susb-annual.html). 
Local Downloadable CSV data. Select U.S. & states, 6 digit NAICS. 
The original number of employers was adjusted to only include those 
with 15 or more employees.
    \13\ See 29 CFR 1607.15A(1): Simplified recordkeeping for users 
with less than 100 employees. In order to minimize recordkeeping 
burdens on employers who employ one hundred (100) or fewer 
employees, and other users not required to file EEO-1, et seq., 
reports, such users may satisfy the requirements of this section 15 
if they maintain and have available records showing, for each year: 
(a) The number of persons hired, promoted, and terminated for each 
job, by sex, and where appropriate by race and national origin; 
(b)The number of applicants for hire and promotion by sex and where 
appropriate by race and national origin; and (c) The selection 
procedures utilized (either standardized or not standardized).

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    For the Commission.

    Dated: December 31, 2024.
Charlotte A. Burrows,
Chair.
[FR Doc. 2024-31755 Filed 1-3-25; 8:45 am]
BILLING CODE 6570-01-P