This guide is intended to direct you to fundamental resources to use when performing research in the area of economics. The resources here are by no means comprehensive, but are intended to help you achieve a sound start to your work.
This video is provides a helpful overview of searching Statista and using dossiers.
NOTE:
This video is a little outdated. The citation function in 2022 Statista is provided through an " icon on the chart. Statista also no longer has a Topics section. The Reports section is similar, though, when it comes to finding dossiers and reports. This video recommends downloading reports as PPT but it's simper to download them as PDF.
This channel has a number of videos that explain how to use FRED (Federal Reserve Economic Data).
Statistical Abstract of the US
The Statistical Abstract of the United States is often the best place to begin when searching for data on nearly any topic pertaining to or within the US. It can be used to find data and it can be used as an index to identify sources of data to explore further. The link above will direct you to the Statistical Abstract series (discontinued after 2012).
The Capital IQ platform combines deep global company information, credit ratings and research, and market research with powerful tools for risk assessments. The web and Excel-based platform provides easy access to both real-time and historical information on companies, markets, transactions, and people worldwide. After authenticating with OpenAthens, users must register for an individual account using their sewanee.edu email address.
Statista is a platform of data and statistics on media, business, finance, politics, and a wide variety of other areas of interest or markets. Statista gathers data from a wide variety of government and commercial sources and presents it in an easy to search interface. Data can be exported to Excel and charts can be exported as picture files or directly into PowerPoint. Data sources are categorized into industries, broad topics, countries, and digital markets.
Contains statistical data for over 800 development indicators and time series data from 1960, for over 200 countries and 18 country groups. Data include social, economic, financial, natural resources, and environmental indicators. Offers many useful features: results can be scaled, mapped, and charted; the mapping function allows users to see the results in a world map that can be resized and zoomed to the country level; data can be exported in standard formats such as Excel. 1960 to present.
Information is gathered by the Development Data Group of the World Bank. Information about their methods of data collection can be found here: http://go.worldbank.org/K2XOMZ5DC0
Find data from the World Bank member countries, including coverage of World Development Indicators from 1960 to the present. A good source for GDP data.
Provides a selection of data sources that small business owners can use for market research (very similar to this page of links, except for business owners instead of college students).
The American Economic Association provides links to a number of data sources in three categories: U.S. macroeconomic data, other U.S. data, and world and non-U.S. data
Statistics from the Organisation for Co-Operation and Development (OECD). Click on the "Development" link located on the left-side navigation for relevant data points.
An individual-level population database. IPUMS provides census and survey data from around the world integrated across time and space. IPUMS integration and documentation makes it easy to study change, conduct comparative research, merge information across data types, and analyze individuals within family and community contexts. Data and services available free of charge. From the American Community Survey. A good source for gender and race data.
The American Community Survey (ACS) is an ongoing survey that provides vital information on a yearly basis. A source for detailed population and housing information about the United States. This survey gathers information such as ancestry, citizenship, educational attainment, income, language proficiency, migration, disability, employment, and housing characteristics.
The human development data are sourced from international data agencies with the mandate, resources, and expertise to collect national data on specific indicators unless otherwise noted.
The data are presented in two sections of the website:
‘Data’ page – provides downloads of over 150 global indicators and composite indices for over 190 countries in CSV and PDF. This page also provides documentation and methodologies, FAQ’s, API access, and other key information.
‘Country profiles’ page – presents HDI values and ranks, data visualizations/trends for the HDI and other composite indices, country explanatory notes, and over 150 other indicators.
Datasets include definitions of indicators and sources for original data components at the end of each table, with full source details in the Statistical references.
Among other things, the ICPSR "maintains a data archive of more than 500,000 files of research in the social sciences. It hosts 16 specialized collections of data in education, aging, criminal justice, substance abuse, terrorism, and other fields." In many cases the files contain raw data that require a statistical tool for use.
Find statistics and data about the federal government, state and local governments, along with information about the Census and maps of the U.S. showing demographic, environmental, agricultural, and weather information.
Find state-level data related to the GDP here. From the About page: "BEA's economists produce some of the world's most closely watched statistics, including U.S. gross domestic product, better known as GDP. We do state and local numbers, too, plus foreign trade and investment stats and industry data."
This monthly publication from the Council of Economic Advisers for the Joint Economic Committee provides economic information on gross domestic product, income, employment, production, business activity, prices, money, credit, security markets, Federal finance, and international statistics. (description provided by the source) This is a great place to find U.S. economic data by month.
Violent crime includes murder, rape and sexual assault, robbery, and assault. Information about murder is obtained on a yearly basis from the FBI’s Uniform Crime Reports. There are two measures for nonfatal violence—the Uniform Crime Reports (UCR) and the National Crime Victimization Survey (NCVS). The NCVS measures rape or sexual assault, robbery, and aggravated and simple assault.
The National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) is the primary federal entity for collecting and analyzing data related to education in the U.S. and other nations. Includes data on public and private schools and colleges.
The FBI's Crime Data Explorer (CDE) provides data on crime and law enforcement. Use the CDE to discover available data through visualizations, download data in .csv format, and other large data files.
Builds upon FRED and offers uncorrected historical economic data. Use ALFRED to grab snapshots of data as it was released to economists and policymakers.
This publication from 1975 "includes more than 12,500 time series, mostly annual, providing a statistical history of U.S. social, economic, political, and geographic development during periods from 1610 to 1970."
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