Research Portal: Business & Economics Research Guide: Statistical Databases

Statistical Data

Business & Economics classes require analysis of statistics, often using SAS software. This page is divided into the types of statistical data available. These databases provide the hard numbers you'll need to do serious anaylsis. Current categories are

Macroeconomic
Business/Finance
International
Social Science

Statistical Data Resources

FRED: Federal Reserve Economic Data
FRED® is a database of over 20,000 U.S. economic time series (1,000 macro series and 19,000 regional series). With FRED®, you can download data in Microsoft Excel and text formats and view charts of data series.

Mergent Online This link opens in a new window
Find company income statements and balance sheets, government filings and industry reports. Company histories and many other reports are also available.
Mergent Online is limited to 10 concurrent users.

World Business Survey
Survey of firms doing businesses companies across the world – areas surveyed: regulation, gender, corruption, finance, workforce, obstacles, crime, trade, innovation. Variables in % of firms. Exportable to Excel.
World Bank
The data catalog is a listing of available World Bank datasets, including databases, pre-formatted tables and reports. Each of the listings includes a description of the data set and a direct link to that set. Search results can be exported in different formats. Users can also choose to download the entire database.
Macro Data of 188 Countries
Key macro data from the IMF for 188 countries: GDP, prices, etc.
Import & Export Prices of Key U.S. Trading Partners
Trade data of the US, and with key trading partners. Import and export prices of goods by industry. Time series and exportable to Excel.
Penn World Tables
The Penn World Table provides purchasing power parity and national income accounts converted to international prices for 188 countries for some or all of the years 1950-2004. The European Union or the OECD provide more detailed purchasing power and real product estimates for their countries and the World Bank makes current price estimates for most PWT countries at the GDP level. Excel spreadsheets files.

ICPSR: Inter-University Consortium for Political and Social Research This link opens in a new window
Statistical datasets in SAS format on topics in the Social Sciences, such as education, criminal justice, substance abuse, and terrorism, among many other fields.

To login, click on the "Login" link in the upper right-hand corner when you are on campus. This will allow you to download the datasets.

Citing Your Sources!

Citing your sources properly -- yes, even the charts and graphs you reuse from other sources, and the statistics you quote -- is important and required.

Purdue University's OWL Writing Lab Citation resources are the best ones out there on the web. Generally, Business & Economics courses require that you use APA citation style. Detailed information on both in-text references and "works cited" pages is available here.

Business & Economics Research Guide

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Statistical Data

Statistical Data Resources

Citing Your Sources!

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