Business & Economic Data

Government data resources for business-including the Consumer Price Indexes, IRS Bulletins, Small Business Association, Better Business Bureau. Find more business resources under international business data, business research guides, and much more.

Governmental Internet Resources

• Censtats

  Census Tract Street Locator, USA Counties 1996, 1994 County Business Patterns, U.S. Merchandise Trade (Password Required)

• Consumer Price Indexes

  Price indexes are available for the U.S., the four Census regions, size of city, cross-classifications of regions and size-classes, and for 26 local areas. Indexes are available for major groups of consumer expenditures (food and beverages, housing, apparel, transportation, medical care, recreation,education and communications, and other goods and services), for items within each group, and for special categories, such as services. Monthly indexes are available for the U.S., the four Census regions, and some local areas. More detailed item indexes are available for the U.S. than for regions and local areas.

• Department of Commerce

  This is the official web site of the Department of Commerce, which provides access to the following sub-agencies: Bureau of Export Administration, Economics and Statistics Administration, Bureau of Economic Analysis, Bureau of the Census, Economic Development Administration, International Trade Administration, Minority Business Development Agency, National Oceanic & Atmospheric Administration, National Telecommunications & Information Administration, Office of Inspector General, Patent and Trademark Office, Technology Administration, National Institute of Standards & Technology, National Technical Information Service, Office of Technology Policy.

• FactFinder

  U.S. Census 2000 information, includes data from the Decennial Census, American Community Survey and the 1997 Economic Census. This information is available with 100% file and Sample file. It also includes tables, maps and data sets.

• How to Create Clear SEC Disclosure Documents A plain english handbook Draft

  Investors need to read and understand disclosure documents to benefit fully from the protections offered by our federal securities laws. Because many investors are neither lawyers, accountants, nor investment bankers, we need to start writing disclosure documents in a language investors can understand: plain English.

• EDGAR 10K filings

  EDGAR, the Electronic Data Gathering, Analysis, and Retrieval system, performs automated collection, validation, indexing, acceptance, and forwarding of submissions by companies and others who are required by law to file forms with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). Its primary purpose is to increase the efficiency and fairness of the securities market for the benefit of investors, corporations, and the economy by accelerating the receipt, acceptance, dissemination, and analysis of time-sensitive corporate information filed with the agency.

• FEDSTATS

  More than 70 agencies in the United States Federal Government produce statistics of interest to the public. The Federal Interagency Council on Statistical Policy maintains this site to provide easy access to the full range of statistics and information produced by these agencies for public use. Please use the feedback button to indicate how well this site meets your needs and any suggestions for improvement.

• Federal Reserve

  This site provides links to all of the Federal Reserve Regional Banks.

• FinanceNet
• Housing and Urban Development

  At this site you will find information about Lenders, Brokers, Housing authorities/ tribes, Multifamily industry, Appraisers, and Health care facilities providers.

• IRS Actions on Decisions

  An AOD indicates the reasoning behind the Service's recommendation whether or not to appeal an adverse decision by a trial or appellate court and whether to acquiesce or nonacquiesce in an adverse Tax Court decision. AODs, which are prepared by attorneys in the Tax Litigation Division, are numbered sequentially by year.

• IRS Internal Revenue Bulletin

  The Internal Revenue Bulletin (IRB) is the authoritative instrument of the IRS for announcing all substantive ruling necessary to promote a uniform application of tax law.

  IRBs are offered here in Adobe PDF format. The Adobe Acrobat reader is available for free and is required to view and print PDF files.

• IRS Tax Forms

  From this site you can download IRS Tax forms, publication and instructions

• IRS Private Letter Rulings
• National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST)

  Standards and a necessity in the business world and this agency assists the marketplace in establishing National Standards for various products. Established in 1901,* NIST strengthens the U.S. economy and improves the quality of life by working with industry to develop and apply technology, measurements, and standards. It carries out this mission through a portfolio of four major programs: Measurements and Standards Laboratories, Advanced Technology Program, Manufacturing Extension Partnership, and Baldrige National Quality Award.

• NonProfit Gateway
• North American Industry Classification System

  This site has a table that compares the new NAICS system with the old 1987 SIC system and visa versa. It describes how NAICS will affect data users, the implementation of the system and how it was developed.

• Small Business Association (SBA)

  The U.S. Small Business Administration, established in 1953, provides financial, technical and management assistance to help Americans start, run, and grow their businesses. With a portfolio of business loans, loan guarantees and disaster loans worth more than $45 billion, in addition to a venture capital portfolio of $13 billion, SBA is the nation's largest single financial backer of small businesses. Last year, the SBA offered management and technical assistance to more than one million small business owners. The SBA also plays a major role in the government's disaster relief efforts by making low-interest recovery loans to both homeowners and businesses.

• U.S. Department of Treasury

International

• Canada's System for Electronic Document Analysis and Retrieval (SEDAR) database

  A comprehensive resource about Canada's publicly-listed companies. Provides access to public financial information for the investment industry and the every-day investor.

• Strategis (Canada's Business and Consumer Site)

  Strategis is produced by Industry Canada a department of the Federal government which employs over 4,000 people across Canada. This site provides: Timely Business and consumer information, business management tools, Business on the Internet, and Government Services on the Internet.

• Guide to doing business in/with China

  This site provides access to Chinese Business Laws and Regulations. It has over 700 documents covering the years 1949 to 1999.

• Inter-American Development Bank

  The Inter-American Development Bank, the oldest and largest regional multilateral development institution, was established in December of 1959 to help accelerate economic and social development in Latin America and the Caribbean. Today Bank membership totals 46 nations. Many frequently asked questions about the Bank are answered in the Basic Facts publication. The Bank's current corporate strategy is described in the July, 1999 report , "Renewing the Commitment to Development."

  In addition to the Bank, the IDB Group consists of the Inter-American Investment Corporation (IIC) and the Multilateral Investment Fund (MIF). The IIC, an autonomous affiliate of the Bank, was established to promote the economic development of the region by financing small and medium-scale private enterprises. The MIF was created in 1992 to promote investment reforms and to stimulate private-sector development.

• International Tax Seminar (Prof. Doernberg at Emory Law School)

  This resource provides links to professor's syllabus's, Book updates, Current Tax News, Web Tax Resources, Tax Server Homepage

• International Trade Administration (ITA)

  This resource provide businesses with trade statistics from various countries around the world along with marketing assistance, U.S. Foreign and commercial service, Import Administration, etc.

• United States International Trade Commission (ITC)

  The USITC is an independent, quasi-judicial federal agency that provides objective trade expertise to both the legislative and executive branches of government, determines the impact of imports on U.S. industries, and directs actions against certain unfair trade practices, such as patent, trademark, and copyright infringement. USITC analysts and economists investigate and publish reports on U.S. industries and the global trends that affect them. The agency also updates and publishes the Harmonized Tariff Schedule of the United States.

Nongovernmental Internet Resources

• Better Business Bureau

  Since the founding of the first BBB in 1912, the BBB system has proven that the majority of marketplace problems can be solved fairly through the use of voluntary self-regulation and consumer education. The BBB's Core Services include:, Business Reliability Reports, Dispute Resolution, Truth-in-Advertising, Consumer and Business Education, and Charity Review.

• EH.net (Economic History Resources)

  EH.Net provides an on-line location for researchers in economic history to make their data series available to other professionals and interested scholars. Several data series have been given to EH.Net and are available as downloadable files, while many other titles may be accessed through our Database Registry.

• Free ZIP Code Lookup

  Free ZIP code lookup with areacode, county, latitude, longitude, MSA, PMSA, congressional district, FIPS code and timezone.

• G8 Information Centre (Univ. of Toronto)

  Since 1975, the heads of state or government of the major industrial democracies have been meeting annually to deal with the major economic and political issues facing their domestic societies and the international community as a whole. The six countries at the first Summit, held at Rambouillet, France in November 1975, were France, the United States, Britain, Germany, Japan and Italy. They were joined by Canada at the San Juan, Puerto Rico Summit of 1976, and by the European Community at the London Summit of 1977. Since then membership in the G7 has been fixed, although 15 developing countries' leaders met with the G7 leaders on the eve of the 1989 Paris Summit, and the USSR and then Russia have had a post-Summit dialogue with the G7 since 1991. Starting with the 1994 Naples Summit, the G7 and Russia have met as the P8 ("Political 8"), following each G7 Summit. The Denver Summit of the Eight was a milestone, marking full Russian participation in all but financial and certain economic discussions; and the 1998 Birmingham Summit saw full Russian participation, giving birth to the G8 (although the G7 continues to function along side the formal summits).

• Geography Network

  The Geography Network is a global network of geographic information users and providers. It provides the infrastructure needed to facilitate the sharing of geographic information between data providers, service providers, and users around the world. The Internet is used to deliver geographic content to the user's browser and desktop. Through the Geography Network, you can access many types of geographic content including live maps, downloadable data, and more advanced services. The Geography Network content is distributed at many locations around the world, providing you access to the latest information available directly from the source. We invite you to explore and participate in the Geography Network.

• Geostat, Census Data from University of Virginia (1990 PUMS data, 1992 Tiger files and (REIS) Regional Economic Information System)

  Geostat supports a wide range of academic and scholarly activities through access to extensive collections of numeric and geospatial data files; computing facilities and software for data manipulation, research, and instruction; and a suite of Internet-accessible data extraction tools.

• Historical Census Browser

  1790 to 1970 covers the data presented here describe the people and the economy of the US for each state and county from 1790 to 1960. This site is intended to aid in browsing these data files. It is not intended as a tool for downloading data for further research or more involved manipulation. Those who require the original data should contact their ICPSR OR or ICPSR itself.

• InterNet Bankruptcy Library (Bankruptcy Creditors Service)

  The InterNet Bankruptcy Library joined the Internet community in December of 1994. If nothing else, we were first. The IBL includes six subject areas related to large-scale business restructurings targeted to the bankruptcy professional seeking information on the Internet. The IBL currently receives thousands of hits each day. The IBL is cited as a resource link from dozens of Web sites and has been featured as a valuable Internet information resource in scores of directories, newspapers, magazines and trade journals.

• Population Studies Center (University of Pennsylvania)

  This site provides economic statistical information concerning: The Mexican Migration Project, Status of Women and Fertility, The Social Networks Project, and the Socioeconomic Survey of Twins.

• Securities Class Action Clearinghouse

  Stanford Univeristy's clearinghouse offers investors, the judiciary, policymakers, and the media a powerful new research tool that provides a deep and careful look into the workings of class action litigation.

  By digitizing and linking the full text of complaints, motions, judicial opinions, and other major class action filings into a Website with its own full-text search engine, the Stanford Clearinghouse offers information that is substantially more detailed and timely than can be found on other services which generally limit their databases to judicial decisions. By accessing this site, the public will be able to form its own opinion as to whether litigation is with or without merit, whether too f ew or too many companies are being sued, and whether recoveries are too small or too large.

• Standard & Poor's United States Indices

  Descriptions, methodology, constituents and data, news, index changes, name and ticker changes, style indices, and sector indices for the for the S&P 500 Index, MidCap 400 Index, SmallCap 600 Index, SuperComposite 1500 Index, S&P 100 Index, S&P/Barra Growth and Value Indices, and REIT Composite Index.

• State Business Filings Databases --Update by Kathy Biehl

  Almost all of the states make some level of Corporate and Business filings available online. In a few instances only limited information (such as name availability) is retrievable. The majority of the states, however, use their Web presence to disseminate a range of public business records -- and most of them offer access at no charge.

• State & Local Taxes Homepage

  This site provides links to the revenue departments of each state for tax forms.

• University of Wisconsin-Madison Center for Demography & Ecology CDE Information Services

  The University of Wisconsin Center for Demography and Ecology Data Library has opened a Data Resources page with annotated links to Social Science Data Extractors; Social Science Data Archives; Public Health Data Sources; Data Resources in Aging; a tutorial on Keeping Current on the Internet; and the CDE Public FTP page. Non-University of Wisconsin researchers do not have access to CDE or University of Wisconsin Data and Program Library Services data.

• ZipCode Level Statistics

  This site provides Data by Zip Code on the following statistical information: Population, Education, Health, Environment, Business, Political.

International Data

• Global Trade Center

  Global Trade Center... provides many valuable international trade services for manufacturers, importers exporters, trade service businesses and opportunity seekers. See our international trade business opportunities and World Trade Plan, free import export trade leads, famous trade bulletin board, traders web sites and web site advertising services.

• National Law Center for International Free Trade

  The Center has recently launched a biweekly publication entitled "Inter-American Trade Report." The Report's purposes are four-fold: 1) to inform readers about recent developments that impact directly upon the decisions to trade and invest in the Americas; 2) to link its articles, commentaries and summaries with the more detailed information available on the Center's InterAm database (the most complete and accessible in the hemisphere); 3) to serve as an ongoing forum for both printed and electronic discussion; and 4) to facilitate trade and investment by helping to identify legal, business and bureaucratic obstacles to hemispheric free trade.

  The Center has undertaken work in the following substantive areas: 1) Banking; 2) Environment; 3) Intellectual Property; 4) Labor; 5) Secured Financing; 6) Securities; 7) Transportation; and 8) Website and Electronic Database.

Primary Law

• CFR Title 26 Internal Revenue
• U.S. Code Title 13 "Commerce and Trade"
• U.S. Code Title 26 "Internal Revenue Code"

Reference Sources

• Commerce Business Daily

  The Commerce Business Daily (CBD) lists notices of proposed government procurement actions, contract awards, sales of government property, and other procurement information. A new edition of the CBD is issued every business day. Each edition contains approximately 500-1,000 notices. Each notice appears in the CBD only once. The CBD databases online via GPO Access contain notices from December 2, 1996 forward.

• Current Industrial Reports

  Manufacturing, Mining & Construction Statistics

• EDGAR 10K filings

  EDGAR, the Electronic Data Gathering, Analysis, and Retrieval system, performs automated collection, validation, indexing, acceptance, and forwarding of submissions by companies and others who are required by law to file forms with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). Its primary purpose is to increase the efficiency and fairness of the securities market for the benefit of investors, corporations, and the economy by accelerating the receipt, acceptance, dissemination, and analysis of time-sensitive corporate information filed with the agency.

• Federal Aquisition Regulations (FARS)
• Globus & National Trade Data Bank

  This site contains daily data on Global business opportunity leads as well as current exchange rates, current and historical trade leads, Market and Country Reports and International trade Statistics by commodity and by country

• State of the Nation

  This site contains financial and economic data from throughout the federal government and other related entities. General Economic Indicators, Consumer Price Index, Producer Price Index, Gross Domestic Product, National Income and Product Accounts, (NIPA) Housing and Construction, Housing Starts and Building Permits, New Construction, New Home Sales, Employment, Employment Cost Index, Local Area Employment and Unemployment, Weekly Unemployment Claims Report, Manufacturing and Industry, Retail Sales, Manufacturing, Trade, Inventories, and Sales, Industrial Production and Capacity Utilization, Current Industry Reports, Monetary Statistics, Selected Interest Rates, Foreign Exchange Rates, Bank Credit, Money Stock, Economic Policy, Beige Book

• SIC Codes OSHA 1987

Research Guides

• National Law Center for International Free Trade

  This site provides access to: the Inter-American Trade Report, English Translations of Mexican legislation, Inter-American Trade and Investment Law Bulletin Archives and legislative information from the following Latin American Countries: Argentina, Belize, Bolivia, Brazil, Canada, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Cuba, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Mexico, Nicaragua, Panama, Paraguay, Peru, Suriname, Trinidad, Uruguay, Venezuela

• Home Page of the Tax Group at Emory University School of Law