The Workforce Information Database (WID) is a normalized relational database structure developed for the storage and maintenance of employment statistics, labor market information, employer listings and related economic and demographic data. The database development project originated from the need for a single, multi-purpose database structure to drive analytical and data display systems.
The WID serves as the cornerstone for information delivery, economic development, workforce research, and product development for information that is standard and comparable across geographic regions. It provides states with a common structure for storing information in a single database but at the same time offers the flexibility that best achieves local, state, and regional needs. Because of data standardization through use of the Workforce Information Database, an unprecedented ability to link the various systems, classifications, and coding schemes can be achieved. These integrated resources, provide unlimited opportunities for the delivery of customized, regional and local information to customers in useful formats.
The database, once populated, brings together critical economic development and workforce information from many sources to promote better analysis and more sophisticated interpretation. The resulting cost savings to the workforce information system as a whole is significant because states and national entities do not have to “reinvent the wheel”. The infrastructure of the Analyst Resource Center and specifically, the WID is in place to facilitate effective information delivery.
The WID contains standardized tables of information for each of the items listed below. Each state is required to populate their database with a core set of data as indicated. However, in order to best achieve local and regional needs, states may choose to add information even beyond those items listed.
Information that can be accessed through the WID include:
Business Employment Dynamics
Building permits
Census data
Current employment statistics
Commuting patterns
Consumer Price Index
Employers
Employment service data including applicant characteristics
Income
Industry development
Industry employment projections
Industry employment and wages
Job vacancies
Local Area Unemployment Statistics
Occupational licenses
Mass Layoff Statistics
Occupational employment projections
Population data
Postsecondary school programs, and program completers
Property values
Quarterly Workforce Indicators
Retail sales
Tax revenues
Unemployment insurance claims
Wage data
The WID allows for states to populate data in the following geographic classifications:
National
State
Metropolitan statistical areas
Workforce investment regions
Service delivery areas
Counties
Minor civil divisions
BLS regions
Broad geographic regions
Planning regions
Labor market areas
Cities
Towns
Townships
Municipality/suburbs
One-stop areas
Workforce development areas
Job center areas
Congressional districts
Census places
Micropolitan statistical areas
Metropolitan divisions
Combined statistical areas
Balance of state
State-defined areas