The Economic Census - Doig

Steve Doig, Arizona State U. Paul Overberg, USA TODAY Philadelphia Jan. 31, 2011 Reynolds Center BusinessJournalism.org

Economic Census
Detailed profile of economy
Conducted every five years since 1967
Most recent year is 2007
Covers all employer establishments (except agriculture and public administration)
Census of large and medium companies; sample of small ones
Individual returns are confidential
Also Survey of Business Owners

Uses of the data
Develop public policy
Evaluate industry growth
Design sales territories and find markets
Gauge competitiveness
Business-to-business
Disaster response

Annual economic surveys
Based on random samples
More recent, but error margins exist
Surveys:
County Business Patterns
Annual Survey of Manufactures: Estimate of statistics for all manufacturers with one or more employees
Non-employer Statistics: Estimates of businesses with no paid employees

Sectors covered
Mining
Utilities
Construction
Manufacturing
Wholesale Trade
Retail Trade
Transportation and Warehousing
Finance and Insurance
Real Estate and Rental and Leasing
Accommodation and Food Services
Services

Data items
Establishments with and without payroll
Total employees
Production workers and hours
Total payroll for year and 1 st quarter
Cost of benefits
Sales/receipts
Type of structure
E-commerce sales
Total expenses
Cost of materials, parts, fuel, electricity, utilities
Taxes, license fees
Cost of office supplies
Cost of ads, rental, legal, accounting
Et al.

Geographies covered
Data summary levels
Nation
State
Metropolitan Areas (1 or more counties)
Counties
Places (with >5k residents or workers)
ZIP Codes (but not ZCTAs)
Coverage varies by geography

Data release schedule
Use American Factfinder to get data
Flows out over a three-year period
Majority of it is available now

Survey of Business Owners
Sent to 2.3 million owners in 2007
Asks about characteristics of owners:
Gender
Race
Ethnicity (including country of origin)
Veteran status

Story ideas
Growth of franchises
Restaurant rebound
Gender, race and ethnic changes in ownership
Change in importance of economic sectors (service over manufacturing, say)

Factfinder.census.gov

Quick Reports
Reports by industry or geography
Data included:
Number of establishments
Sales, receipts, etc.
Annual payroll
Number of employees

Economy-wide statistics
Data for each subsector (NAICS 6-digit), nation, state, county, MSA
More than 3.3 million rows!
Can filter by geography and sector
Can download into Excel (if filtered to <65k rows)

Detailed statistics tables
Compare 2002 and 2007
Get data by sector
How to use: Download into Excel to sort and filter

The Economic Census - Doig

by Reynolds Center for Business Journalism

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