(Restricted) Integrated Longitudinal Business Database (ILBD)

Résumé 0

The Integrated Longitudinal Business-level Database (ILBD) covers all employer and nonemployer business units in the non-farm private U.S. economy. The ILBD: 1) Integrates the employer and nonemployer universes on a year-by-year basis, ensuring that each unique business entity is counted once and only once; 2) Constructs longitudinal links for business units within each universe; 3) Constructs contemporaneous and dynamic ownership links across universes between employer and nonemployer business units. The source data for the ILBD draw on payroll tax records, corporate and individual income tax returns, applications for an Employer Identification Number (EIN), and various Census Bureau business surveys. The data available to the Census Bureau depend on the legal and tax status of a business and, in certain respects, on the size of the business and the number of its locations. For large corporations, routine data inputs include payroll records and particular items from corporate income tax returns, augmented by direct Census Bureau collections for multi-location companies. For sole proprietors, partnerships, and single-location corporations with employees, routine data inputs include payroll records, certain items from income tax returns and periodic Census Bureau surveys such as the quinquennial Economic Census. For nonemployer businesses, routine data inputs derive mainly from income tax returns. Linking records from different sources requires common business identifiers. Businesses with employees have unique Employer Identification Numbers (EINs) and other Census Bureau identifiers. Some nonemployer businesses also have an EIN, but most do not and instead are tracked by the person ID of the business owner, i.e., his or her Protected Identification Key (PIK) (the PIK is a Census Bureau analog to the SSN). In addition to the longitudinal links within each universe, the Census Bureau created a set of links between the employer and nonemployer universes. These links make use of numeric identifiers, business names, and other data items found on records in both universes. Use of these data requires Internal Revenue Service (IRS) approval. The Census Bureau will coordinate all additional necessary reviews.