The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) recently announced that the 2024 EEO-1 Component 1 data collection period is scheduled to open on May 20, 2025 and close on June 24, 2025 (2024 EEO-1 Component 1 Instruction Booklet).
Employers with 100 or more employees must report data about their workforce, including job category and the sex and race or ethnicity of their employees. Federal contractors must also report this data if they have 50 or more employees, are a prime contractor or first tier subcontractor, have a contract, subcontract or purchase order amounting to $50,000 or more, and are not otherwise exempt.
Additionally, on April 15, 2025, the EEOC submitted a “non-substantive” Information Collection Request (ICR) to the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) for approval ahead of its 2024 data collection. Among the requested changes, the EEOC seeks OMB approval for the elimination of the option allowing employers to voluntarily report on employees who self-identify as “non-binary.” The EEOC states the request is made to comply with Executive Order 14168, “Defending Women From Gender Ideology Extremism and Restoring Biological Truth to the Federal Government.”
The change would apply to the Instruction Booklet and not to the data collection template. The EEOC’s proposed revision to the Instruction Booklet’s “Reporting by Sex” section would reduce the section to one sentence, to state:
“The EEO-1 Component 1 data collection provides only binary options (i.e., male or female) for reporting employee counts by sex, job category, and race or ethnicity.”
The EEOC’s 2023 Instruction Booklet previously stated that:
“The EEO-1 Component 1 data collection currently provides only binary options (i.e., male or female) for reporting employee counts by sex, job category, and race or ethnicity. However, employers may voluntarily choose to report employee demographic data for non-binary employees – that is, employees who do not identify as exclusively male or female – by sex (i.e., non-binary), job category and race or ethnicity in the “comments” section of the report(s). Employers that voluntarily choose to report non-binary employees in the “comments” section of the report(s) should not assign such employees to the male or female categories or any other categories (i.e., job category and race or ethnicity) within the report(s).”
If an employer is not sure whether they are required to file an EEO-1 Component report, or are not sure what information they need to do so correctly and timely, they should seek out employment law counsel who are experienced filing this form.
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