The Labor Department’s Office of Inspector General (OIG) has opened a review into the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), citing major challenges in data collection following historic revisions to U.S. jobs data and cutbacks in inflation reporting.

In a letter released Wednesday, Assistant Inspector General for Audit Laura Nicolosi said the watchdog will examine BLS’s methods for gathering and reporting data, with a focus on:

• Producer Price Index (PPI) and Consumer Price Index (CPI) data collection.
• Monthly employment data, including revisions and reporting practices.

The probe comes after the BLS last week issued its largest jobs revision in over 20 years, lowering employment estimates by 911,000 jobs for the year ending March 2025. That sharp downward revision sparked concerns over the accuracy of federal economic reporting.

The OIG review also follows BLS’s decision to scale back data collection for two key inflation measures, raising questions about how comprehensive future PPI and CPI figures will be.

Leadership Scrutiny
The letter was addressed to William Wiatrowski, the acting BLS commissioner. He stepped in after former BLS head was fired by President Donald Trump in early August, following the release of a weak monthly jobs report.

Nicolosi wrote that the probe will focus on both the challenges BLS faces and the mitigating strategies it is adopting to ensure reliable economic data.

With both inflation and employment figures critical to U.S. economic policy, the watchdog’s review could have far-reaching implications for the credibility of official labor statistics.