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Subject: Econ. Resources on the Internet [5 of 20]
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Summary: This document contains a list of resources of interest
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Last-modified 1999/09/30
Version: vol. 4 no. 2
Url: http://rfe.org

Resources for Economists on the Internet, Vol. 4, No. 2, September, 1999

Editor: Bill Goffe <[email protected]>
Editorial Assistant: Elise Braden <[email protected]>

Part 5 of 20

This guide, sponsored by the American Economic Association, lists
more than 1,000 resources on the Internet of interest to academic and
practicing economists, and those interested in economics. Almost all
resources are also described.

Resources for Economists on the Internet (RFE) is a copyrighted work
of the American Economic Association (the "AEA"). Permission to make
digital, electronic or hard copies of part or all of RFE for personal
or classroom use, Usenet distribution, or mailing lists is granted,
provided that copies are not made or distributed for profit or direct
commercial advantage and that whole copies show the following notice:

"Resources for Economists on the Internet (RFE), Copyright 1999
American Economic Association"

Otherwise the AEA owns the exclusive right to print, publish,
distribute, reproduce, sell, prepare derivative works, transmit,
download, or otherwise transfer copies of RFE. Copyrights of
components of this work owned by others than the AEA must be honored
and attributed to the rightful owner. Abstracting and short quotes
are permitted. To copy otherwise or to republish otherwise, including
on web pages, in whole or in part requires prior specific permission.
Permissions may be requested from the American Economic Association,
2014 Broadway, Suite 305, Nashville, TN 37203, or via E-mail:
[email protected]. RFE is provided without any express
or implied warranty.

----------------------------------------------------------------------

For distribution via Usenet, this FAQ is split into 20 parts as large
files don't travel well on Usenet. For other locations of this guide,
see the section titled "1.5 Where to Obtain This Guide" in part 2.

2.3.0 World and Non-U.S. Data

2.3.1 Alta Plana International Economics Gateway

[various international and non-U.S. entities]

This site, run by Seth Grimes, has a number of links to sites with
non-U.S. data. Specifically, he lists "Resource Pages and Data
Archives" (for general economic resources), "International
Organization Pages," "National Government Pages," and "Corporate
Servers" (of many varied types that economists are likely to find
useful).

# http://altaplana.com/gate.html

2.3.2 Central Bank Resource Center

[both central banks and ministries of finance]

This site, run by Mark Bernkopf, deals with all aspects of central
banking. This includes an extensive list of central banks and
ministries of finance. There are numerous other items of interest,
including currency boards, conferences in the area, multilateral
financial institutions, monetary research institutes and
consultancies, central bank research departments, and other
resources.

# http://patriot.net/~bernkopf/

2.3.3 Econ. Departments, Institutes and Research Centers in the World
(EDIRC): Statistical Offices

[very many listings]

This section of this very useful resource contains a section on
"Statistical Offices." In all, EDIRC lists more than 4,000 sites.

# http://ideas.uqam.ca/EDIRC/statoff.html

2.3.4 Econ. Departments, Institutes and Research Centers in the World
(EDIRC): Central Banks and Monetary Authorities

[very many listings]

This section of this very useful resource contains a section on
"Central Banks and Monetary Authorities." In all, EDIRC lists more
than 4,000 sites.

# http://ideas.uqam.ca/EDIRC/central.html

2.3.5 Statistical Data Locators

[directory of international stat sites]

This site, part of the library at Nanyang Technological University in
Singapore, offers a very extensive list of international data sites
on the Internet (as one might expect, its first listing is
Singapore). It is organized by region: "Asia, Oceania, North America,
Europe, Africa, International, Latin America, and Others."

# http://www.ntu.edu.sg/library/statdata.htm

2.3.6 CIA World Factbook 1998

[well-known summary data and analysis]

This well-known reference has wide-ranging summary data on 263
countries and other similar entities from around the world. While the
economic information is of the snapshot variety, it includes a
written overview and some 20 current observations of key economic
values. There is also extensive information on geographical,
demographic, government, communications, transportation, military,
and "transnational issues" for each country.

# http://www.odci.gov/cia/publications/factbook/

+ 2.3.7 EIU CountryData
+
+ [271 mostly quarterly series from 116 countries]
+
+ This dataset comes from the "Economist Intelligence Unit," which of
+ course is affiliated with "The Economist" magazine. EIU CountryData
+ results from a partnership between the EIU and Bureau van Dijk: the
+ data is collected by the EIU and the software is developed by Bureau
+ van Dijk. The data comes from a variety of sources, and it covers
+ 116 countries from 1980 with some 271 variables (for most countries,
+ the data is quarterly). Forecasts are available to five years in the
+ future. The data is updated monthly, although data on each country
+ is updated four times each year. The discounted annual cost for a
+ standard, single academic user is $7,800 (with higher group rates).
+ Data can also be purchased by geographic region. For non-academic
+ pricing and regional rates, call 1-888-797-7120.
+
+ A key feature of this dataset is the very feature-laden interface. It
+ could well eliminate the need for pre-processing with a spreadsheet
+ or other programs. They also provide extensive support, and one can
+ communicate with those responsible for collating the data. Trial
+ subscriptions can also be arranged.
+
+ # http://www.bvdny.com/products/eiu/overview.htm

+ 2.3.8 GlobalMetrix
+
+ [very extensive international and trade data]
+
+ This firm sells a great variety of data from a number of
+ international organizations and packages them in easy-to-use formats.
+ Specifically, data is available from 72 countries (which can be
+ purchased by country, region, or the world), and some 64 industries,
+ including 80 internationally traded commodity groups with an initial
+ date of 1980, and forecasts to 2017. Quoting from their material
+ (with some editing for brevity) they offer:
+
+ # Global Consumer Spending - 16 spending categories
+ # Gross Fixed Investments - 64 industry and service sector
+ expenditures
+ # Global Government Expenditures - 10 categories
+ # Global Industry and Services Output - 64 industry and service
+ sector gross-outputs
+ # Global Employment and Occupation - number of employees in 64
+ industry and service sectors
+ # Global Wage and Salary - annual wage and salary per employee in 64
+ industry categories
+ # Global Pollution - estimates of toxic waste release by 64
+ industries for 300 noxious substances
+ # Global Commodity Trade - covers 80 commodities, produced by 50
+ industries, showing bilateral trade between 65 countries and
+ regions worldwide (4,225 trade routes)
+ # AirFlow - covers air freight volume between 65 countries and
+ regions worldwide (4,225 trade routes)
+ # SeaFlow - covers ocean freight volume between 65 countries and
+ regions worldwide (4,225 trade routes)
+ # PaxFlow - includes passenger traffic for 50 major route corridors
+ worldwide.
+
+ The data can be purchased in many different increments -- it can be
+ purchased by county, region, or country. As one would guess, the cost
+ per observation decreases as they size of the purchase increases.
+
+ In addition, "Intelligence Reports" "of a particular country,
+ economic sector or trading relationship" are also available for
+ purchase. They are updated every six months. Finally, "Customized
+ Models" can be created at a customer's request.
+
+ # http://GlobalMetrix.com

2.3.9 Luxembourg Income Study (LIS)

[households survey from 25 countries and macro data from OECD
countries]

This project brings together household surveys from 25 countries
(surveys from four other countries are under negotiation) into a
common database to make studies of international economic comparisons
easier. For instance, it includes Current Population Surveys from the
U.S., French Surveys of Income, and a Hungarian Income Study. To
maintain confidentiality and restrictions on use, the data remains on
the host computer in Luxembourg and researchers run jobs remotely on
that system through electronic mail. Users must first register to use
the database.

They also have a database (Institutional Database, IDB) of annual
macro indicators on all OECD countries. This database also contains
rules on taxes and transfers in each country to make international
comparisons possible. This dataset is available on floppy disks.

This site also includes the Comparative Welfare State Database, which
focuses on a wide range of indicators of welfare state development,
its causes, and its outcomes on an annual basis for the period
1960-89.

The purpose of the LES project "is to construct a databank containing
Labour Force Surveys from the early nineties from countries with
quite different labour market structures. These surveys provide
detailed information on areas like job search, employment
characteristics, comparable occupations, investment in education,
migration, etc." The micro data from the labour force surveys has
been standardized to facilitate comparative research.

The datasets are well documented, and workshops and newsletters help
the researcher to use this complex database. They also offer working
papers.

# http://lissy.ceps.lu/index.htm
# Tim Smeeding, Overall Project Director: <[email protected].
edu>
# Kati Foley, Administrative Assistant (U.S.): <[email protected].
edu>
# Caroline de Tombeur, Administrative Assistant (Europe):
<[email protected]>
# Koen Vleminckx, Technical Questions <[email protected]>
# Tim Smeeding, Overall Project Director: <[email protected].
edu>
# Inge O'Connor, Administrative Assistant (U.S.): <[email protected].
edu>
# Caroline de Tombeur, Administrative Assistant (Europe):
<[email protected]>

2.3.10 OANDA

[current and historical exchange rates]

This organization is owned by "Olsen & Associates" which is said to
be a leader in financial and especially foreign exchange studies and
forecasts. Here they make their foreign exchange data available. Both
current and historical rates can be found for some 164 countries.
Daily historical data is available from 1990, and a single table can
have as many as 2,000 observations. Forecasts are also available, as
are various specialized features.

# http://www.oanda.com

2.3.11 PACIFIC Exchange Rate Service Retrieval Interface

[current and historical exchange rates]

This offering, run by Werner Antweiler of the Policy Analysis
Division, Faculty of Commerce and Business Administration, University
of British Columbia (and named PACIFIC for Policy Analysis Computing
& and Information Faculty in Computing) offers two types of exchange
rate data: current and historical. In both cases daily data is
available, and from many countries (65 countries are updated daily,
and about 200 are updated at least weekly; not all countries have
historical data). It also provides a list of all currencies of the
world and each country's exchange-rate arrangements, as well as
analysis and trend projections of the Canadian Dollar. The data comes
from Xenon Laboratories.

# http://pacific.commerce.ubc.ca/xr/

2.3.12 Penn World Tables (Univ. of Toronto)

[valid cross-country comparisons (data ends in 1992, however)]

This organization, which for a fee also makes available the Canadian
CANSIM database, demonstrates how the web can make it very easy to
retrieve economic data across the Internet. With your browser, you
can very easily select and retrieve individual or multiple series
from this database (in formats for most any statistical program), or
plot them interactively. It sets the standard for data retrieval on
the Internet.

This dataset covers 152 countries with 29 time series. They are
carefully adjusted to make comparisons meaningful.

# http://arcadia.chass.utoronto.ca/pwt/

2.3.13 PRS Online Country Data

[purchase current and historical data from 144 countries]

This firm takes data from the World Bank, IMF, OECD, the CIA and
others and resells it here on-line. They offer data from 144
countries, and for each country they have some 50 annual series from
the last 10 years. Coverage includes domestic economic conditions,
international transactions, geographical and political data, and
various social indicators. They also offer risk ratings and macro
forecasts.

While being a subscriber is more efficient for bulk purchases, it is
possible to purchase one series or a group of series. A single series
is $5, and and all data for a country is $50.

# http://www.countrydata.com/

2.3.14 Resource Centre for Access to Data on Europe (r�cade)

[data from Eurostat can be purchased here]

This organization currently sells access to datasets from three
different organizations: Eurostat, ILO (International Labor
Organization), and UNESCO. They are an official host of Eurostat, and
the data includes all of the "New Cronos" database, which is a fairly
comprehensive dataset; it has detailed agricultural, energy,
economic, industrial, and demographic information (some of the data
is available down to the NUTS 3 level). The ILO data contains
information on labor conditions from around the world (such as
injuries, unemployment, wages, hours, strikes, etc.). Perhaps the
most interesting part of UNESCO data is the educational material.
This organization has a variety of pricing models, including reduced
rates for academics. Bills can be paid by credit card.

# http://www-rcade.dur.ac.uk/

2.3.15 Asian Development Bank

This site describes all aspects of this bank's work. This not only
included information about themselves, but also includes business
opportunities, news releases, extensive information on their
projects, and their work with law and development. There is also
extensive material on their publications.

For many countries in the region, they offer fairly lengthy time
series data on national accounts, the financial system, trade, and
other indicators. Data is also available in spreadsheet format.

# http://www.adb.org/

2.3.16 Eurostat

This organization, which covers economic activity for the European
Union, currently offers press releases, information about itself,
information on products and EU-specific CD-ROMs and databases,
on-line indicators, on-line catalogs, and statistical news.

# http://europa.eu.int/eurostat.html

2.3.17 Inter-American Development Bank

This sites describes many aspects of the bank's work. It also has
extensive information on their projects, press releases,
publications, some information on business opportunities, information
on their private sector projects, and information on the
Inter-American Investment Corporation, Multilateral Investment Fund,
and Regional Fund for Agricultural Technology.

They also have fairly extensive summary statistical data on their
member countries.

# http://www.iadb.org/

2.3.18 International Trade Centre UNCTAD/WTO (ITC)

This organization, jointly operated by the UN and WTO, deals with
international trade (particularly with developing and transitional
countries). Besides detailed information on their mission and
programs, they offer considerable data on-line (and even more is
available on their CD-ROM products). Their COMTRADE database contains
detailed import and export statistics from 1962 for more than 100
countries. This data is available on a CD-ROM product. In addition, a
subset of this data is available on-line. It identifies the largest
and most dynamic import and export countries and highlights the most
important import/export products (3 digits level) of the Standard
International Trade Classification Revision 3.

# http://www.intracen.org/

2.3.19 Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD)

You can read extensive information on the the OECD's activities,
publications, and their data products here. The "Statistics" section
offer a variety of socio-economic indicators. Of particular interest
are "Economic Statistics," which offers some recent summary data for
OECD countries. "Latest short-term indicators" and "Frequently
requested statistics" provide much of the most useful data (the
former is basically the last quarter's data, while the latter
includes GDP, GDP per capita, unemployment, and the like). However,
there are no publically available long length time series. There is
also some analysis of current economic conditions. News releases and
newsletters can be found in the "News and Events" area.

# http://www.oecd.org

2.3.20 International Monetary Fund (IMF)

The IMF has responded to recent complaints about their operations by
becoming more transparent itself. At this site, you can read a great
deal about the IMF (including its annual report and extensive
material on its structure), their fact sheets on a number of topics,
press releases, news briefs, speeches from the managing director, and
details from their publications catalog. Among data, they offer
currency exchange rates. Among publications, they offer the "IMF
Survey" (which "provides topical coverage of the IMF's activities,
policies, and research in the context of global economic and
financial developments") and the full text of IMF Working Papers,
Staff Country Reports, and Papers on Policy Analysis and Assessment.
They also offer "Letters of Intent, Economic Programs, Memoranda of
Economic and Financial Policies and Policy Framework Papers" for the
various countries that they deal with. Finally, their "Dissemination
Standards Bulletin Board" is available here. The Special Standard and
its associated bulletin board provide access to international capital
markets and their economic and financial data with equal and ready
access for all users. For many countries, it lists where most any
sort of macro data can be obtained (including on the Internet) from
countries that participate in this program. For just the U.S., this
is a very useful resource as it says who generates various series and
how they are collected.

# http://www.imf.org

2.3.21 U.N. Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD)

This part of the U.N. has the major responsibilities for trade and
development. Here, they offer extensive information on the
organization (including its "basic documents"), its many varied
projects, its upcoming meetings and events, and press releases. There
are links to its "Debt Management and Financial Analysis System,"
newsletters on the "Generalized System of Preferences" and "Trade
Facilitation and Multimodal Transport," and summary information on
their publications, including "Trade and Development Report," "World
Investment Report," "Least Developed Countries Report," "Handbook of
International Trade and Development Statistics," and "Review of
Maritime Transport."

# http://www.unctad.org/

2.3.22 U.N. Food and Agricultural Organization (FAO)

This organization's mission is well described by its title. Perhaps
most useful to economists is their extensive collection of
agricultural, fisheries, forestry, economics, and nutrition data from
around the world. This site provides information on WAICENT, the
World Agricultural Information Center. It also offers FAOSTAT, an
online and multilingual database which currently contains 1 million
time-series records on international statistics. Besides data, there
are a number of items of additional interest and links to other
sites.

# http://www.fao.org/

2.3.23 U.N. Statistics Division/DESIPA

This section of the U.N. collects various statistical information.
Perhaps of greatest interest is data from the "Monthly Bulletin of
Statistics," which is now available on-line for a fee (currently $295
for academic users, and $525 for the "for profit" sector). Data
includes national accounts, labour force, prices, forestry, industry,
mining, energy, manufacturing, construction, finance, international
economic relations, transport, and population. There is also snapshot
cross country data for many socio-economic indicators.

# http://www.un.org/Depts/unsd/index.html

2.3.24 World Trade Organization (WTO)

This organization oversees international trade. Their web site has
three main sections: general information about WTO, trade topics, and
international trade resources. You can register for e-mail
notification of "new developments, updates, publications, reports
etc." They offer information on goods, services, intellectual
property, environment, development, policy reviews, dispute
settlements, government procurements, legal texts, and international
trade. They also offer working papers and information on the economic
research and analysis division (ERAD). Their "Document Dissemination
Facility" (DDF) that offers "selected documents" (such as those that
established the WTO). Finally, they have news releases (including an
area of restricted access for the news media).

# http://www.wto.org

2.3.25 India 1997-98 Budget

This site has information on the 1998 budget of India, with many
details. Also presents information on past budgets, Exim Policy,
Credit Policy, analyses and opinions, and EcoSurvey 98.

# http://budget.allindia.com/

+ 2.3.26 Statistics Indonesia
+
+ This site provides information about this Indonesian governmental
+ agency, as well as listing information on the country's statistics by
+ both subject and region; summaries of new statistics; macroeconomic
+ statistics; census summaries; abstracts, papers, and research;
+ publications, and a statistical glossary. The macroeconomic
+ statistics are reported monthly and can be downloaded with Adobe
+ Acrobat Reader. Information includes charts on inflation, consumer
+ price index, wholesale price index, exports and imports, and tourism.
+ Where statistics are organized by subjects, one can find explanations
+ and definitions of each subject, the methods used to gather
+ statistical information, publications, and statistical tables.
+
+ The subjects featured are population, employment, social welfare,
+ wages, agriculture, manufacturing, mining, energy, construction,
+ tourism, foreign trade, transportation, communication, public
+ finance, consumer price index, wholesale price index, consumption and
+ expenditure, and national and regional accounts. If tables are not
+ available on the site, they can be requested through Data
+ Dissemination Services.
+
+ # http://www.bps.go.id/

2.3.27 Bank of Japan

Besides information about the bank, they offer extensive information
on their publications (including CD-ROMs), a list of dates for press
releases as well as press releases and speeches, current exchange
rates, reports (including the "Monthly Report of Recent Economic and
Financial Developments," "Quarterly Economic Outlook," the "Annual
Review of Monetary and Economic Developments," the "Monthly Economic
Review," and the "Flow of Funds." Data (including long time series)
includes the money stock, TANKAN Outline ("Short-Term Economic Survey
of Enterprises in Japan"), various price indices and interest rates,
foreign exchange rates, and data from financial institutions.

# http://www.boj.or.jp/en/index.htm

2.3.28 Japanese Macro Data

This site contains some 20,000 macro series from Nikkei Needs. It has
been reformatted into the ASCII format used by the BCI Data Manager.
When you first use this site, be sure to read the warnings concerning
some oddities in the data and details on how to search for it (the
data is located in this database with a WAIS search).

# http://econom10.cc.sophia.ac.jp/needs/index.htm

2.3.29 Kokumin Keizai Research Institute

"Kokumin Keizai Research Institute (KKRI) is an independent,
nonprofit organization which conducts economic and policy research."
Founded in 1945, it has more than 700 members. It generates forecasts
for the Japanese economy (available here), and studies of industries,
regions, Asia, and various public policy issues. A simplified version
of their macro model can be obtained here (it requires either Eviews
or the FAIRMODEL).

# http://www.kkri.org/index_eng.htm

+ 2.3.30 National Statistical Office of Korea
+
+ This site provides information on the National Statistical Office of
+ Korea, its statistical database (KOSIS), statistical reports, graphs,
+ publications, and surveys. Recent graphical data on land and
+ population; agriculture; mining and manufacturing; energy;
+ construction; wholesale, retail trade and services; transportation
+ and communication; labor and wages; prices and household economy;
+ money and banking; finance; national accounts; balance of payments
+ and economic cooperation; education, science and health; society
+ tourism and environment; and international statistics is provided on
+ the site. However, the statistical report section provides an
+ economic and financial data link to the Bank of Korea, where one can
+ find statistics dating back to 1970.
+
+ # http://www.nso.go.kr/

2.3.31 Canadian Industry Statistics

This site provides details of various aspects of Canadian economic
activity, emphasizing economics, employment, international trade,
investment, public equity financing, growth indices, and other
business-related information. The Canadian Industry Statistics site
is comprised of 5 main components: The CIS Classic, Public Equity
Financing, Growth Trends, Industry Overview, and other World Wide
Links. The CIS Classic offers data on 230 Canadian manufacturing
industries, focusing on variables such as wages and salaries, number
of employees, operational costs, manufacturing shipments, imports,
exports, and performance by establishment size. It is also possible
to make comparisons across Canadian national averages in various
statistics for each manufacturing industry. This information is
available for downloading in WordPerfect format. The Industry
Overview serves as a complementary function to CIS Classic by
providing an analysis of Canadian industry trends in production,
investment, research and development, employment, and trade. The
section also provides comparative analyses of Canadian and U.S.
industries.

# http://strategis.ic.gc.ca/sc_ecnmy/sio/homepage.html

2.3.32 Statistics Canada

Currently, Statistics Canada, the Canadian national statistical
agency, provides information from their daily report, the "Daily," on
this site. It contains substantial summary macro information for the
last few quarters. Previous issues of the "Daily" are available as
well. It also contains information on Canadian statistics, census
data, ordering their publications, lists of offices, their
classification systems, subscription information on their listserv,
and ordering information on their database, CANSIM (which has more
than 650,000 time series on Canada).

Another entry of this guide deals with "Statistics Canada CANSIM" , a
fee-based collection of Canadian statistical data.

# http://www.statcan.ca/
# Information: Michael Thoen <[email protected]>

2.3.33 Statistics Canada CANSIM

This extremely extensive database (it has more than 650,000 time
series) covers a very wide variety of social and economic data in
Canada. Unfortunately, the data is not freely available, although
customers can retrieve the data over the Internet through an
agreement with the University of Toronto, or you can purchase
individual data on-line. For academic users, the database costs $995,
though discounts are possible in some situations.

# http://www.statcan.ca/english/Pgdb/
# Information: Bill Graham, Statistics Canada <[email protected]>
# Information: Chris Leowski, University of Toronto <chris@chass.
utoronto.ca>
# Information: Bill Graham, Statistics Canada <[email protected]>
# Information: Chris Leowski, University of Toronto <chris@epas.
utoronto.ca>

2.3.34 Austrian and Eastern European Economic Data (WIFO)

This site is run by the Austrian Institute of Economic Research, and
it offers two datasets. The first is a comprehensive dataset of the
Austrian economy with more than 20,000 time series (there is an
emphasis on long time series). The second dataset has some 5,000 time
series of "Central Europe and the former Soviet Republics: Bulgaria,
Croatia, the Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland, Romania, Slovakia,
Slovenia, Russia and Ukraine" starting with 1989. Data must be
purchased, but it is available on-line.

# http://www.wsr.ac.at

+ 2.3.35 Hungarian Central Statistical Office
+
+ This statistical office focuses on "designing and conducting surveys,
+ recording, processing and storing data, data analyses, and
+ dissemination, protection of individual data." This site provides
+ links to the professional and scientific institutes of the Hungarian
+ Central Statistical Office; publications, periodicals, and major
+ surveys conducted by the Hungarian Central Statistical Office; press
+ releases; a glossary of statistical terms; current statistical
+ figures, including geography, road, population, employment, incomes,
+ consumption, dwellings, education, GDP, tourism, and financial;
+ recent Office reports; annual figures; and subscription information
+ for the data of HCSO STADAT.
+
+ # http://www.ksh.hu/

2.3.36 Research Institute of the Finnish Economy (ETLA)

This private organization offers information on their forecasting
activities (they produce a number of publications) and general
economic studies. They also offer a substantial amount of data,
including international data and thousands of time series on the
Finnish economy, but one must register to use it.

# http://www.etla.fi

+ 2.3.37 Statistics Finland
+
+ This site provides information on Finland's main center for
+ statistical information, recent statistical news, the Library of
+ Statistics, statistical databases and other electronic products, and
+ statistical data. The economic statistics section focuses on GDP,
+ employment and unemployment, and industrial production dating back to
+ 1991, and consumer price inflation since 1996; recent information on
+ population, families, education, employment, income, and electoral
+ participation; and main economic indicators from Europe and the
+ Pacific Region. Online databases include FINREGION--a regional
+ database that provides about 6000 short time series for every region
+ included; FINSERIES--a long time series database which covers the
+ production, consumption, trends, employment and other economic
+ information for the whole country; and the Bulletin of Statistics,
+ which is a diskette produced monthly containing both monthly and
+ quarterly updated economic statistics. Information on obtaining the
+ online products is provided.
+
+ # http://www.stat.fi/

+ 2.3.38 National Institute of Statistical and Economic Studies
+
+ This site contains information on the National Institute of
+ Statistics and Economic Studies (INSEE), its products and services,
+ and key figures for the French economy. Tables provide numeric
+ information on twenty-five key figures, with all but seven dating
+ back to 1970. This data includes information on important economic
+ statistics such as income, labor, employment, consumer prices,
+ businesses, GDP, production, and financial markets.
+
+ # http://www.insee.fr/

2.3.39 Bundesbank

The central bank of the Federal Republic of Germany offers extensive
information about itself at this site. Other items of interest are
their press releases and speeches. Of greater interest is their
"Monthly Report," which includes extensive macroeconomic and
financial data on Germany (though for recent years). They even offer
daily updates for some of the data (mostly financial data). You can
also find a list of their publications.

# http://www.bundesbank.de/index_e.html

2.3.40 German Federal Statistical Office

This site offers information about itself (including helplines),
extensive press releases, short term economic indicators (GDP and the
like for recent years), basic statistical figures, time series (only
in German at the moment), and book and media store (including on-line
data).

# http://www.statistik-bund.de/e_home.htm

2.3.41 Statistik Regional (German Regional Stats)

This site provides extracts from the "Statistik regional" dataset
published by the federal and regional statistics offices of Germany.
It covers population, health, education, employment, agriculture and
forestry, industry, construction, tourism, transport, social
services, financial statistics and taxes, national accounting,
environmental data and election results. It has the complete coverage
of themes of the full version but the level of disaggregation is not
as deep. (As I do not read German, Thomas Krichel kindly wrote this
for me.)

# http://www.brandenburg.de/statreg/

+ 2.3.42 Statec
+
+ This site provides information on the Central Service for Statistics
+ and Economic Studies in Luxembourg (Statec), its role as the national
+ statistical institution of Luxembourg, and its products and services.
+ The statistical information presented on this site consists of
+ economic data, including tables dating back to the early 1980s for
+ employment, population, national accounts, and the budget; and dating
+ back to the early 1990s for producer price index, activity indices
+ for industry, and consumer price index.
+
+ # http://statec.gouvernement.lu/

2.3.43 Netherlands Bureau for Economic Policy Analysis (CPB)

The CPB is a research center for the Netherlands which provides macro
analyses and forecasts. It is also the budgetary and economic policy
accounting center for the Netherlands. This site provides general
information about the CPB; member information; press releases (mostly
in Dutch); job openings and seminar listings; publications, with both
Dutch and English reports of the outlook for the Dutch economy;
information on the current research agenda, highlighting the most
important projects of the year; and downloadable economic data in the
form of spreadsheet files (mostly in Dutch).

# http://www.cpb.nl/eng/

2.3.44 Netherlands Central Bank

At this site, this central banks offers information on itself, its
banknotes, news releases, details of its supervisory duties, and
monetary and financial statistics (relatively long time series are
available). Information on the research department is available, and
there is extensive information on their research papers. In addition,
they offer some software, "Fysioen," which illustrates macro
principles, which are derived from "MORKMON," their macro econometric
model of the Dutch economy.

# http://www.dnb.nl/english/index.htm

2.3.45 Statistics Netherlands

This site contains current information on the Dutch economy. There is
also summary demographic and social information on the Netherlands,
information on the institution, and press releases. There appear to
be no long term time series. This site also provides access to
StatLine, which is the statistical database on the Netherlands.

# http://www.cbs.nl/

+ 2.3.46 Statistics Sweden
+
+ This site provides information on Statistics Sweden, its products and
+ services, databases, press releases, statistical fields, recent news,
+ and statistics. The statistics section consists of economic
+ statistics; population; research and development; information
+ technology; construction; housing and settlement; and education. For
+ economic statistics, there are graphics for economic indicators such
+ as inflation rate, trade, employment, GDP, and others, dating on
+ average to the early 1990s. Also provides consumer price index data
+ dating back to 1949 and net price index data dating to 1959.
+
+ # http://www.scb.se/

2.3.47 Bank of England

Founded in 1694, this central banks offers on-line information about
itself and its various functions. Of specific interest are its
extensive set of publications; many of them are on-line, including
the "Monetary Policy Committee Minutes" (which supersedes the
"Minutes of Monthly Chancellor/Governor Meetings"), the "Inflation
Report," and reports on the gilt market (debt securities issued by HM
Treasury) and on the Euro. Other reports, "Fact Sheets," and speeches
are available, as is information on British banknotes and its "Centre
for Central Banking Studies."

# http://www.BankofEngland.co.uk

2.3.48 BizEd Net: CSO Data (U.K.)

BizEd (Business Education) Net is designed for students and faculty
members, and others interested in obtaining data. They currently
offer the Penn World Tables, and perhaps more importantly, some data
from the Office for National Statistics of the U.K., which is a
substantial resource with economic datasets and labor market data.
Also offered are MIDAS (Manchester Information Datasets Associated
Services), summary demographic data from the U.S. Census Bureau,
Extel Data (Which has substantial financial data for 500 well-known
companies), Company Report Browser, and Company Report Profiler.

# http://bizednet.bris.ac.uk:8080/home.htm

2.3.49 ESRC Data Archive

This UK archive, funded by the University of Essex, the Economic and
Social Research Council, and the Joint Education Systems Committee,
is the largest social sciences and humanities archive in the United
Kingdom. It holds nearly 7,000 social science computer datasets, both
historical and contemporary, that are in some way related to the U.K.
(about the U.K., conducted by U.K. investigators, or of interest to
U.K. users). For economists, datasets of particular interest include
the CSO Macroeconomic Databank, the Family Expenditure Survey, and
the Labour Force Survey. In addition, some of datasets contain
multi-country surveys, so other countries are frequently included.
Thus, this archive is of interest even to non-U.K. economists. Since
the datasets are held under agreement with the depositors, one must
contact the archive for information on how to obtain the data, some
of which is available on-line (other formats include CD-ROMs and
tapes, diskette, and DAT).

# http://dasun2.essex.ac.uk/

2.3.50 HM Treasury

This site contains extensive information on the U.K. budget (both
proposed and past ones). Other information includes the "National
Assets Register," the "Debt Management Report" from recent years,
fiscal policy papers, forecasts for the U.K. economy (both
independent and from the "The Financial Statement and Budget Report
(FSBR)" (also known as the "Red Book"), and information on the Euro.
There are also press releases, statements by the Chancellor (and
speeches by him and others), a list of print publications, and
extensive information on the Treasury.

Two mailing lists (one on press releases, the other on new Internet
offerings by the H.M. Treasury) are described in the mailing list
section titled "E - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics" .

# http://www.hm-treasury.gov.uk/
# ftp://ftp.hm-treasury.gov.uk
# Information: <[email protected]>
# Suggestions: <[email protected]>

2.3.51 Manchester Information Datasets and Associated Services (MIDAS)

This site offers a variety of services for U.K. users. In particular,
it offers the National Dataset Service that has, or will soon have,
many datasets of interest to economists. Datasets for registered
users include the IMF's International Finance Statistics (with 24,000
time series from 196 countries), Balance of Payments Statistics
(35,000 time series from 160 countries), Direction of Trade
Statistics (61,000 time series from 184 countries), and Government
Finance Statistics Yearbook (19,000 time series from 145 countries);
the 1991 U.K. Census in various forms; the General Household Survey;
the National Labour Force Survey; the Family Expenditure Survey; the
British Household Panel Study; Office of National Statistics
Macro-econ Databank (with 3000 U.K. time series); the OECD's Main
Economic Indicators (with more than 2500 time series).

Some of this data is from the ESRC Data Archive at the University of
Essex.

# http://midas.ac.uk/

+ 2.3.52 Office of National Statistics
+
+ This site provides information on the U.K. Office of National
+ Statistics, press releases, statistics, products and services, and
+ the Census. The statistical data includes economic and financial
+ trends, the purchasing power of the pound, employment, output of
+ industries, and national accounts. Also available on this site is
+ information about both the DataBank Subscription Service (which
+ provides monthly, quarterly and annual macroeconomic time series
+ data) and StatBase (which is the official on-line government database
+ of key statistics).
+
+ # http://www.ons.gov.uk/ons_f.htm

2.3.53 Scottish Economic History Database, 1550 - 1780

This database has data on crop yields, demographic data, price
series, wage series, and weather statistics for the time period
1550-1780. Detailed information on this dataset is on-line here, and
is also in AJS Gibson and TC Smout, "Scottish food, wages and prices,
1550 - 1780," Cambridge University Press, 1994. They ask that any
users report use of this database to further the financial support
for it, and that users cite its use.

# http://www.ex.ac.uk/~ajgibson/scotdata/scot_database_home.html

2.3.54 Israel Central Bureau of Statistics

Besides a listing of the CBS' publications, dates of press releases,
and information about itself, this site offers a substantial amount
of on-line information. This includes data from the "Monthly Bulletin
of Statistics" (available in several formats) which has 18 different
categories from climate to public order (most of the categories are
economic, such as national accounts, balance of payments, foreign
trade, finance, prices, labor and wages, industry, etc.). In
addition, there is a very useful search engine.

# http://www.cbs.gov.il/engindex.htm

2.3.55 Praedicta: Israeli Economic Data

This company specializes in a wide range of data on Israeli and world
economy; in all, more than 50,000 series are available. Of interest
to economists is their economic data, which includes demographic
information, national accounts, balance of payments, foreign trade,
finance and taxes, price indices and exchange rates, the labor
market, and many other areas. It is a fee-based service.

# http://www.praedicta.com/

2.3.56 Central Bank of Turkey

This site offers a wealth of economic information on Turkey with 43
different data groups. Data includes Outstanding External Debt, Daily
Exchange Rates, Interest Rates on Deposits, Treasury Wholesale
Prices, Treasury Istanbul Wage Earners Index, SIS Wholesale Prices
Index, SIS Consumer price Index, Consolidated Budget, Balance of
payments, Weekly Monetary Aggregates, GNP at Fixed Prices, and SIS
Monthly Industrial Production. This site also offers information on
the bank history and functions, as well as information on
publications.

# http://www.tcmb.gov.tr

2.3.57 Australian Bureau of Statistics

This site provides information on the ABS; media releases; products
and services, including its catalog of publications; and statistical
data. Data includes key national indicators (national accounts,
international accounts, consumption and investment production,
prices, labor, income, and financial markets) and Census information.

# http://www.statistics.gov.au

2.3.58 New Zealand Treasury

Currently, this site offers material on recent budgets, and a
substantial amount of information on general fiscal issues and New
Zealand, such as their annual report, an overview of the country's
financial and economic framework, some regulatory issues, etc. It
also contains working papers and educational resources.

# http://www.treasury.govt.nz/

2.3.59 Reserve Bank of New Zealand

This central bank offers information about itself, its most recent
"Monetary Policy Statement," its forecasts, a summary of recent New
Zealand economic policy, some of its "Information Pamphlets," and
recent press releases and speeches. The "Reserve Bank of New Zealand
Bulletin" is offered online at no charge. Finally, they offer
information on bank regulation.

# http://www.rbnz.govt.nz/

2.3.1.0 World Bank

2.3.1.1 World Bank

[wealth of development info with summary country data]

Besides a considerable amount of information on itself and on topical
issues (including news releases, speeches, and summaries of new
projects), the World Bank offers a wealth of information on
development and growth topics. Their "Country Data" <http://www.
worldbank.org/data/countrydata/countrydata.html> (part of the "Data"
area) offers "Country Briefs" (several thousand word descriptions of
economic policies and events) and "Country-at-a-Glance" (summary
statistical information, with many cross-country comparisons). They
also offer "World Development Sources (WDS)" <http://www-wds.
worldbank.org/> which has some 6,000 searchable World Bank reports
(the search engine is quite sophisticated).

In "Development Topics," there are many items of interest for
economists. They include "Economics & Trade:"

# AIDS Economics
# Central Capital Markets
# Economic Growth Research
# Economic Management and Policy Courses
# Environmental Economics and Indicators
# International Financial Architecture
# IFC Loan Syndications
# Prospects for Development

"Finance & Private Sector Development" offers

# Investment Information (IPAnet) and Privatization Opportunities
(PrivatizationLink)
# Microfinance - Sustainable Banking with the Poor
# Private Sector Development
# Resource Mobilization and Cofinancing

The "Research" <http://www.worldbank.org/research/> area includes

# Abstracts of Current Studies
# Policy Research Working Papers
# Topic-Specific Research Sites
# Annual Bank Conference on Development Economics (ABCDE)
# Evaluations of Research
# Frequently Asked Questions
# Speeches of the Chief Economist

Also available are various well-known publications (some portions or
even all of some of them are on-line, and some back issues are
available as well):

# The World Development Report
# Assessing Aid
# Confronting Aids
# Global Economic Prospects
# World Development Indicators
# World Bank Journals
# Development Economics Newsletters
# World Bank Policy and Research Bulletin
# Various "Policy Research Reports"

Other parts of the web site include "Partnerships," which lists those
who do similar work (by regions and by subject areas), "Regional
Focus," with resources by geographical region, and the "Development
Forum" which uses electronic methods (mailing lists and such) to
discuss development issues. It is described as "Where the development
community meets to share knowledge and experiences." Finally, their
"InfoShop" brings their on-line bookstore and public information
center (PIC) together.

# http://www.worldbank.org/

2.3.1.2 Economic Growth Research

This project, sponsored by the Macroeconomics and Growth Division of
the Policy Research Department of the World Bank, and the
International Center for Economic Growth (San Francisco) examines
"the relationship between national policies and economic growth." It
offers two basic resources: abstracts and especially data from
articles, and abstracts and data on World Bank working papers on this
subject. It also offers links to a newsletters registry and weekly
seminar information.

# http://www.worldbank.org/html/prdmg/grthweb/growth_t.htm

2.3.1.3 Finance & Development

This quarterly magazine is published by the IMF. The publication
ended a co-publisher arrangement with the World Bank on June 1998.
Publication covers a wide range of important issues for both the
international monetary system and the global economy. Currently, the
online issues begin with the March, 1996 issue.

# http://www.imf.org/fandd

2.3.1.4 Living Standards Measurement (LSMS)

This section of the World Banks studies poverty in developing
countries. The information here includes an overview of LSMS survey
and datasets, specific information from several surveys, (including
some data), reports that use the data, and information for managers
of new surveys.

# http://www.worldbank.org/html/prdph/lsms/lsmshome.html

2.4.0 Finance and Financial Markets

2.4.1 Bond Market Association

[material on this important market]

While much of this site is devoted to material of interest to this
industry trade group, they do offer interesting annual data on this
market, which of course has an important macro impact. For instance,
in their "Research Desk" you can find find the percent of U.S.
Treasury securities held outside the U.S.

# http://www.psa.com/

2.4.2 Center for Research in Security Prices (CRSP)

[key security price data set]

This very well-known data set tracks security prices from the New
York Stock Exchange, American Stock Exchange, and the NASDAQ Stock
Markets from 1926. Here you can read about how to buy this data, as
well as obtain support.

# http://www.crsp.com/

2.4.3 CRSP Data Access and Analysis

[suggestions on using CRSP]

This site doesn't offer CRSP data, but it does offer a number of
guides and links to using it. The sponsor of this site, Don Cram, has
also written a paper on accessing this dataset.

# http://www.stanford.edu/~doncram/crsp.html

2.4.4 Financial Data Finder at Ohio State

[lists numerous financial data sets]

This site provides a number of pointers to financial datasets and
other financial information both on and off the Internet. In
addition, it lists information about on-line business libraries.

# http://www.cob.ohio-state.edu/dept/fin/osudata.htm

2.4.5 Finance Area (Top Services International)

[lists some 6,000 finance sites]

This site, with something of a European emphasis, is said to list
some 6,000 sites in finance. Major headings include companies,
markets, the EU Market, stocks, valuables, vademecum (for travelers),
offshore, equity, analysis, and miscellaneous.

# http://www.tsi.it/finanza/index.html

2.4.6 FINWeb

[lists finance sites]

"The primary objective of FINWeb is to list Internet resources
providing substantive information concerning economics and
finance-related topics." To this end, resources are broken up into
the following categories: electronic publishing (both journals and
working papers), databases, other servers in finance and economics,
miscellaneous topics, and highly recommended general resources. It is
another good place to look for financial market information.

# http://www.finweb.com/

2.4.7 Global Financial Data

[historical finance data]

To quote from Brian Taylor, who is the President of this service: "We
offer extensive historical financial data. On our site we provide
free over 700 years of inflation data, and 200 years of data on
exchange rates, interest rates and the stock market. We also provide
long-term data on stock market returns and inflation rates for almost
40 countries. Our database includes data on over 50 countries and
includes monthly data back to the 1690s."

To quote from their offerings:

The Long-term Monthly Database includes over 500 series of monthly
data on stock markets back to 1693, exchange rates back to 1624 and
inflation rates back to 1748. Over 50 countries are included in the
database.

The United States Interest Rate Database includes 70 series of weekly
interest rate data. Data begin in 1835 on a monthly basis and in 1872
on a weekly basis.

The Foreign Interest Rate Database includes over 400 series of
monthly foreign interest rate data from 50 countries. Monthly data
begin in 1700 and go back to the 1800s for most major economies.
Discount rates, interbank rates, money market rates, government bond
yields and treasury bond yields are included.

The United States Daily Stock Market Indices Database includes 75
series of daily stock market data. All major United States stock
market indices are complete back to their beginning. Daily data begin
in 1885.

The Foreign Daily Stock Market Indices Database includes over 200
series of daily stock market data from 45 world stock markets. Daily
data begin in 1930.

The United States Stock Market Sector Database includes over 350
series of weekly sector data back to 1918. Monthly data go back to
1871.

The Foreign Stock Market Sector Database includes over 1300 series of
monthly sector data for 25 countries. Data begin in the 1920s or
earlier for the world's major stock markets.

Some of these series, and summary information on the rest, is offered
for free, and the rest can be purchased. As appropriate, there are
frequent updates.

# http://www.globalfindata.com/

2.4.8 Investment FAQ

[Usenet FAQ on finance]

This document is the FAQ for the newsgroup misc.invest. As such, it
covers a wide variety of material for individual investors, such as
mutual funds, the tax code, financial planning, trading, technical
analysis, and much more.

# http://www.invest-faq.com/
# ftp://rtfm.mit.edu/pub/usenet/news.answers/investment-faq/general

2.4.9 OSU Virtual Finance Library

[nice listing of finance sites for academics]

This listing of finance resources on the Internet is quite
wide-ranging. It breaks finance sites up into the following set of
categories:

# New Links
# Popular Sites
# Banks
# Exchanges
# World Market
# Insurers
# Investment Banks
# Current Quotes
# Market News
# For Investors
# For Researchers
# For Students
# For Executives
# For Educators

The "For Researchers" area is particularly extensive (though densely
packed with information).

# http://www.cob.ohio-state.edu/~fin/overview.htm

2.4.10 Public Domain Financial Data

[various freely-available data sets]

This site allows those with financial data they would like to share
to place it at a common site. Thus, some caution might be advised
since the data may not be "official." Details about this site can be
found in the "README" file.

# ftp://sunsite.unc.edu/pub/archives/misc.invest

2.4.11 SEC EDGAR

[electronic filings with the SEC]

This database opened in January of 1994. It covers public filings by
U.S. public companies made to the SEC from that data, this includes
such things as 10K, 10Q, annual, quarterly reports, and many other
items.

Previously, this database was available only through Mead Data in
either inconvenient locations or at very considerable expense. In an
experiment, it was available at no cost over the Internet. The
experiment was deemed a success, and now the SEC itself makes the
data available.

This database only covers filings made from 1994 on, for public
consumption, and when made electronically by the filing company.
Thus, it does not cover earlier years, current paper fillings, or
non-public ones.

There are a number of utilities that make using this large database
easier. Some help you easily search for material, and another formats
EDGAR fillings into WordPerfect format.

# http://www.sec.gov/edgarhp.htm
# ftp://ftp.sec.gov/edgar

2.4.12 Wall Street Directory

[listing of finance sites]

This directory claims to list nearly 10,000 separate web pages
organized separate ways for different uses.

# http://www.wsdinc.com/

2.5.0 Journal Data and Program Archives

2.5.1 Economic Journal Datasets Online

Datasets from articles from the "Economic Journal" can be found here.
Data is from papers from 1995 to the present, where not restricted by
copyright or technical issues.

# http://www.res.org.uk/datasets/

2.5.2 Journal of Applied Econometrics

Authors of papers accepted after 1994 are required to put the data
from their paper here unless there is a very good reason (such as
excessive size or confidentiality considerations). There is some data
from earlier papers.

# http://qed.econ.queensu.ca/jae/
# ftp://qed.econ.queensu.ca/jae
# Information: James MacKinnon <[email protected]>

2.5.3 Journal of Business and Economic Statistics

Programs and data from publications in this journal can found here.
Current authors are expected to place their data and program here.

# ftp://www.amstat.org/jbes/View/

2.5.4 Journal of Money, Credit and Banking

This journal, which may have well started economists' interest in
data archiving, now offers data and programs from empirical articles
since the start of 1996. The only exception is proprietary data and
exceptional circumstances.

# http://economics.sbs.ohio-state.edu/jmcb/volumes.html