Skip to Main Content

Statistics and Data Sources by Subject

Business

Global Entrepreneurship Monitor (GEM)

From the Global Entrepreneurship Research Association, London Business School

Data from global study of entrepreneurship (covers more than 100 countries; data from more than 200,000 interviews a year over nearly 20 years). Examines "the entrepreneurial behavior and attitudes of individuals" and "the national context and how that impacts entrepreneurship." Includes key indicators, full individual-level datasets, reports, and country profiles. (source: website)

 

Historical Corporate Reports

From Watson Library, Columbia University

 

Historical Corporate Reports Online

From University of Pennsylvania Library

 

Industry Statistics Portal

From the U.S. Census Bureau

Provides access to industry-level economic data. 

 

Subsidy Tracker 3.0

From Good Jobs First, a national policy research center

This is "a national search engine for economic development subsidies and other forms of government financial assistance to business." Data is presented at the company level. (source: website)

 

U.S. Small Business Association (SBA) resources:

-Business Data and Statistics

Designed for use by would-be entrepreneurs, includes links to data regarding industries, businesses, and targeted consumer groups. 

-Open Data Sources

Links to SBA datasets available for public use

-Small Business Data Resources (last updated in 2013)

"...major sources of data collected by the U.S. government and available for research on small business." (source: website)

 

The World Bank "Doing Business" Project

The Doing Business project, launched in 2002, looks at domestic small and medium-size companies and measures the regulations applying to them through their life cycle. The project provides objective measures of business regulations and their enforcement across 190 economies and selected cities at the subnational and regional level. (source: website) Explore the data, view the ranking of economies based on their ease of doing business, view reports and economy profiles, create a custom query, and much more. 

Finance

Archival Federal Reserve Economic Data (ALFRED)

From the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis

ALFRED allows you to retrieve vintage versions of economic data that were available on specific dates in history. In general, economic data for past observation periods are revised as more accurate estimates become available. As a result, previous vintages of data can be superseded and may no longer be available from various data sources. Vintage or real-time economic data allows academics to reproduce others' research, build more accurate forecasting models, and analyze economic policy decisions using the data available at the time.

Per the St. Louis Fed website: " Most users are interested in FRED and not ALFRED. In other words, most people want to know what's the most accurate information about the past that is available today (FRED) not what information was known on some past date in history (ALFRED)." See listing for FRED below.

 

 

Dow Jones Industrial Average® (DJIA) data:

 

Economic Research and Data

From the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System ("Federal Reserve Board")

"Economists at the Federal Reserve Board conduct innovative research on a broad range of topics in economics and finance." Includes data releases, and links to tools including the Data Download Program (DDP), where users can download data related to selected Federal Reserve Board statistical releases. (source: website)

Also, refer to individual Federal Reserve Bank websites for additional economic and finance data.

 

Electronic Data Gathering, Analysis, and Retrieval (EDGAR)

From the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). 

"All companies, foreign and domestic, are required to file registration statements, periodic reports, and other forms electronically through EDGAR. Anyone can access and download this information for free." (source: website) 

Includes filings by corporations, funds, and individuals. Coverage details.

 

Electronic Disclosure for Investors' Network (EDINET)   (Japan)

From the Financial Services Agency, Japan.

Access to public securities documents filed within Japan. 

 

Federal Reserve Archival System for Economic Research (FRASER)

From the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis

FRASER is "both a digital library of economic history and a repository of the institutional history of the Federal Reserve System. As such, FRASER preserves and provides access to economic and banking data and policy documents." (source: website)

 

Federal Reserve Economic Data (FRED)

From the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis

FRED offers U.S. and international time series data for economic research.

(Also, see listing for ALFRED above.)

 

Geographical Federal Reserve Economic Data (GeoFRED®)

From the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis

"GeoFRED® allows you to create, customize, and share geographical maps of data found in FRED®. Easily access the details and adjust how the data are displayed. You can also transform the data and download it according to geographic category and time frame." (source: website)

(Also, see listings for ALFRED® on the "A" tab and FRED® on the "F" tab.)

 

Google Finance

Access 40 years' worth of stock market data, updated in real time. 

 

Internal Revenue Service (IRS) Tax Statistics

There is a lot more here about Taxes and the IRS than just stats. 

 

Quandl

Free version of a subscription resource that includes "hundreds of free data sets from 'central banks, exchanges, brokerages, governments, statistical agencies, think-tanks, academics, research firms and more.'" (source: website)

Free account registration is required in order to download data.

 

SEDAR - System for Electronic Document Analysis and Retrieval (Canada)

From the Alberta Securities Commission

"...provides access to most public securities documents and information filed by issuers with the thirteen provincial and territorial securities regulatory authorities ("Canadian Securities Administrators" OR "CSA") in the SEDAR filing system." (source: website)