| Home |
 |
Student Resources |
|
We are providing URLs for World Wide Web sites that are commonly available to Internet users at no cost. Links within each site are shown in italics. We have avoided listing data available only to subscribers, such as the ICPSR (Interuniversity Consortium for Political and Social Research), and costly, finance-related CD-ROMs such as FAME Economics (the former Citibase Macroeconomic Database) or Compustat. Ask your instructor if your institution offers access to any of these sources.
This site provides recent data about occupations, their wages (medians and midranges) for states and for the country as a whole, and trends in employment and job growth. It also contains a profile for each state giving recent demographic, income and unemployment statistics, rankings of occupations by largest employment, fastest growing, highest paying, and most openings. The sources for the information include the Bureau of Labor Statistics and state departments and agencies.
Perhaps the richest source of domestic labor statistical data, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) home page provides numerous links for obtaining data in a variety of ways. In some instances, the link leads to a table. In other cases, users must complete a form for the system to extract and produce a table of the desired data. Some of the more useful links from the BLS home page are:
The Labor Force Statistics page includes texts of P-70 reports, Dynamics of Economic Well-Being, available either in text or PDF format. There is also a link to the Survey of Income and Program Participation (SIPP), http://www.sipp.census.gov/sipp/, the longitudinal survey of adults in households designed to improve the measurement of the economic situation of persons, families, and households in the United States, and the effects of Federal and state programs on the wellbeing of families and individuals. While the data extraction system is designed for the proficient data user, the link to Publications and Analyses contains statistical briefs, SIPP P-70 Reports, SIPP Working Papers and other publications available in either PDF or text format. *
The Bureau of the Census has conducted the Current Population Survey (CPS) for the Bureau of Labor Statistics for more than 50 years. It is the primary source of information on the labor force characteristics of the population of the United States. Estimates obtained from the CPS include employment, unemployment, earnings, hours of work, and other indicators and are available by a variety of demographic and other characteristics. In the Basic Monthly Survey of the scientifically selected 50,000-household sample representing the civilian non-institutional population, information is obtained about the employment status of each member of the household 16 years of age and over. Supplements to the basic CPS include: the Annual Demographic Survey, which gathers information on more than 50 different sources of income, including non-cash benefits, and on comprehensive work experience; Displaced Workers; Race and Ethnicity; Contingent Workers and Alternative Employment; Job Tenure and Occupational Mobility; School Enrollment; Work Experience; and Work Schedules. The link to Publications provides tables on numerous topics from Census Bureau press releases. They can be accessed through a subject index, a chronological list of news releases, or a publication keyword search form.
The National Center for Education Statistics' mission fulfills a congressional mandate to collect, collate, analyze, and report complete statistics on the condition of American education. The site provides keyword searching of numerous reports, some of which are available in PDF format. In addition, the site contains statistical compendia, including:
Major compendia are listed under ED Stats at a Glance, or, from the main page, click on Electronic Catalog, then use the search tools to see a complete list.
The Inspection Data page for OSHA provides standards as well as links to Workplace Injury, Illness and Fatality Statistics. Some tables for incidence rates and fatalities are text files that display immediately, while some are PDF files requiring Adobe Acrobat Reader. The Bureau of Labor Statistics provides the source material, data, and tables. OSHA-specific statistics on data and time series information is monitored through the OSHA Office of Statistics.
The data collection for this study has been ongoing since 1968 with the aim of providing a better understanding of the determinants of family income and its changes. It continues to trace individuals from the original national sample of approximately 4,800 households. The investigators hoped to discover whether most short-term changes in economic status are due to forces outside the family or if they can be traced to something in the individual's own background or in the pattern of his or her thinking and behavior. The questions asked deal specifically with topics such as employment, income sources and amounts, housing, car ownership, food expenditures, transportation, do-it-yourself home maintenance and car repairs, education, disability, time use, family background, family composition changes, and residential location. Supplemental information on additional topics, such as health, wealth, retirement plans, flows of time and money, help among families and their friends, and motivation and efficacy, is gathered on an intermittent basis. The Bibliography link from the PSID homepage leads to a list of publications, working papers and government reports based on the Panel Study of Income Dynamics. Custom subsets from the PSID final-release and early-release main datasets can be created through the Data and Documentation - Data Center link. The Data and Documentation - Data Files link allows downloading of entire datasets: main datasets 1968-1993 (final release), supplemental datasets and documentation, and main datasets 1994-1999 (final release). A 1992 CD-ROM includes 1968-1992 final release and supplemental files.
Eurostat's mission includes providing the European Union with "a high-quality statistical information service for devising, managing and assessing common policies; setting up a European statistical system using a common language linking the national statistical systems; ... and supplying the general public with statistical information, including the use of new electronic media." One result is the development of the home page of the Statistical Office of the European Communities with a variety of useful links.
Providing technical assistance for labor statistics lies within the mandate of the ILO, which is the specialized agency of the United Nations seeking to promote social justice and internationally recognized human and labor rights. The Statistics link on the Quick Access menu offers some data sources. Statistics on a specific subject can also be found by using the ILO search engine, pairing the word "statistics" or "table" with the subject of interest. (A word of warning: the phrase "table of contents" in a document will also match a search using the word "table.") One useful and easy-to-use page is the Cost of Social Security 1990-1996 (http://www.ilo.org/public/english/protection/socsec/publ/css/cssindex.htm). The links to social security costs and expenditures worldwide, for at least one of the inclusive years, are listed alphabetically by country.
Since its beginning in 1983, the LIS Project has grown into a cooperative research project with a membership that includes countries in Europe, North America, the Far East and Australia. The database now contains information on more than 25 countries for one or more years. The social and economic data are collected from household surveys. The LIS databank has a total of over 60 datasets covering the period 1968 to 1997. Since 1994, a new project associated with LIS was set up: the Luxembourg Employment Study, in which micro data from 13 national labor force surveys have been standardized and made available for comparative research. Additional country files became available during 1998. The aim of the LES project is to construct a databank from countries with quite different labor market structures. These surveys provide detailed information on areas like job search, employment characteristics, comparable occupations, investment in education, and migration. Academic researchers may submit requests for data from the databank by using SAS, SPSS or STATA statistical packages, incorporating the job into the body of the e-mail request.
The OECD promotes the economic and social welfare of its member nations by assisting in the design and coordination of national policies. Information on various topics is available by clicking the topic on the left-hand side. The Statistics link leads to a variety of data files in Adobe Acrobat and Microsoft Excel format. The Statistics Portal link classifies data by topics. The Frequently Requested Statistics link includes a useful list of data. Documentation offers a snapshot of OECD economics by country.
|