There is a tremendous amount of data available to
economists. The list of links presented below is not
exhaustive, but it is a good start. We organize the
sources into four topics: U.S. Economy, Firm Level Data,
Individual Level Data and International Data. In the
case of the U.S. Economy we further break down some of
the categories into primary sources and secondary
sources. Primary sources collect the data themselves.
Secondary sources present data collected by others.
Secondary sources are not necessarily inferior to
primary sources. The advantage of primary sources is
that they contain the most recent and the most accurate
data. In addition, they tend to provide useful
information on how the data is collected. The advantage
of secondary sources is that they normally put together
information from more than one primary source, thus
eliminating the need to search from more than one
primary source.
|
U.S. Economy, Primary Sources: |
| Bureau
of Labor Statistics |
contains information on prices,
wages, employment, etc. |
|
Bureau of Economic Analysis |
contains information on GDP,
aggregate investment, consumption, exports,
imports, etc. |
|
Federal Reserve |
includes information on interest
rates, exchange rates, industrial production,
banking, etc. |
|
Bureau of Census |
includes information on nearly
everything of particular interest may be
economic programs including
economic census and
American Fact Finder. |
|
FedStat
|
has a
list of nearly 70 federal statistical agencies. The
most commonly visited by our students include the
National Center for
Education Statistics, the
National Center
for Health Statistics, the
Department of Housing and Urban Development, the
Bureau of
Transportation Statistics, the
American Statistical Association, Statistics in
Sports,
FDIC Bank Data and Statistics, the
Energy Information Administration, the
Rockefeller Institute of Government, State and Local
Fiscal Data, and the
Internal
Revenue Service. |
| |
|
|
U.S.
Economy, Secondary Sources: |
|
Statistical Abstract of the United States
|
is an
excellent collection of domestic data on the
economy, health, crime, elections, etc. Recent
editions are available online. Past editions are
available as hard copy in the library. |
|
DRI
|
contains
macroeconomic data from a number of sources
including those cited above. The database can be
accessed through E-views. |
|
Fred
II |
is a
comprehensive macroeconomic and financial database
maintained by the St. Louis Fed. |
| |
|
|
Firm Level Data: |
|
Mergent Online |
has current and
historical accounting data for U.S. as well as
foreign companies. |
|
Yahoo! Finance |
has historical stock prices, recent
accounting data and analyst estimates. |
|
SEC's EDGAR |
contains company filings including
quarterly and annual reports. |
| |
|
|
Individual or Household Level
Data:
Students should be aware that the amount of data
in this type of dataset can be overwhelming! |
|
Current Population Survey (CPS) |
is a monthly survey of 50,000
households. Contains data on earnings, education
levels, marital status, etc.
DataFerrett is downloadable software which can
help you extract variables from CPS. |
|
Panel
Study of Income Dynamics (PSID) |
follows the same families since
1968. Collects data on economic, health and social
behavior. |
|
National Longitudinal Surveys (NLS) |
contains various surveys of
individuals regarding their economic, health and
social behavior.
This site helps you extract variables from NLS. |
|
Current
Expenditure Survey |
provides information on the buying
habits of American consumers, including data on
their expenditures, income, and other
characteristics. |
| |
|
|
International Data: |
|
World Development Indicators
|
is a comprehensive database on
economic, social and environmental indicators from
all countries of the world. |
|
International Financial Statistics |
is a database on macroeconomic
indicators including exchange rates, balance of
payments, financial systems, etc. for all countries
of the world. |
|
Morgan
Stanley Capital International |
has information on stock market
indices around the world. |
|
European Central Bank, Statistics |
has
data on interest rates, monetary aggregates and
balance of payments. |
|
International Statistical Agencies |
is a list of links to foreign
counterparts to the Bureau of Census. You will need
a lot of patience and some language skills to tap
this fascinating source of data. |
|
Other: |
|
International
Consortium for Political and Social Research |
is the world's largest archive of
computerized social science data. |
|
CIESIN |
has data regarding human
interactions in global environmental change. |
|
Statistical Data from Schaffer Library |
is a list of books from Schaffer
Library containing statistical data. |
