Due to staff shortages, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics faces challenges in data collection.

Odaily reported that for most of the past year, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics faced staff shortages due to a federal government hiring freeze, which affected the collection of price data and forced the agency to rely more heavily on less accurate estimation methods for filling in some data gaps. In February this year, when estimation was required, the Bureau of Labor Statistics used the so-called "different-cell imputation" method in 40% of cases, compared to only 9% a year earlier. However, the situation may be easing.