RESOURCES FOR ECONOMISTS ON THE INTERNET
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Financial Economics Network
Announcements for Academics
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RESOURCES FOR ECONOMISTS ON THE INTERNET
Version 6.0
Bill Goffe
Dept. of Economics and International Business
University of Southern Mississippi
Hattiesburg, MS 39406
bgoffe@whale.st.usm.edu
(601) 266-4484 (office)
(601) 266-4920 (fax)
May 18, 1994
TABLE OF CONTENTS
0. NOTE
1. INTRODUCTION
2. NEW IN THIS VERSION
3. U.S. MACRO AND REGIONAL DATA
A. Economic Bulletin Board (EBB)
* B. EconData
* C. Bureau of Labor Statistics (LABSTAT)
* D. Federal Reserve
E. New England Electronic Economic Data Center (NEEEDc)
+ F. Economic Report of the President
+ G. Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia
4. OTHER U.S. DATA
A. National Archives Center for Electronic Records
B. Social Security Administration (OSS-IS)
* C. FedWorld
D. Public Domain Financial Data
E. Census Data
* F. EDGAR (SEC)
G. U.S. Department of Agriculture Economic Research Service
+ H. Martin Wong's and George Holt's Market Report
+ I. Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC)
+ J. U.S. Census Bureau
5. WORLD AND NON-U.S. DATA
A. Luxembourg Income Study (LIS)
* B. Vienna Stock Market
C. Productivity Analysis Research Network (PARN)
* D. World Bank Public Information Center (PIC)
+ E. Country Reports on Economic Policy and Trade Practices for 1992
+ F. Statistics Canada
+ G. Manchester Computing Centre -- National Dataset Service
+ 6. DATA ARCHIVES
+ A. Inter-university Consortium for Political and Social Research (ICPSR)
+ B. ESRC Data Archive
7. WORKING PAPERS AND BIBLIOGRAPHICAL SERVICES
* A. NetEc (BibEc & WoPEc)
* B. Working Paper Archive (Wash. Univ., St. Louis)
C. Feminist Economists Discussion Group Archive
+ D. Bank Structure Conference Papers
+ E. Economic Literature Index
+ 8. JOURNAL DATA AND PROGRAM ARCHIVES
+ A. Journal of Business and Economic Statistics
9. ELECTRONIC JOURNALS AND NEWSPAPERS
A. Wall Street Journal and New York Times News Service
+ B. Cyberchronicle of Political Economy (COPE)
10. GOPHERS AND WORLD WIDE WEB SERVERS
A. Economics Gopher at Sam Houston State University
B. Computational Economics Gopher
* C. Economic History Server operated by the Cliometric Society
* D. National Bureau of Economic Research Gopher
E. Academe This Week (Chronicle of Higher Education)
F. Washington Univ. at St. Louis Econ. Dept.
G. RiceInfo
H. University of Michigan Economics Department
I. Communications for a Sustainable Future
J. SunSITE
* K. RISKNet
L. Florida State College of Business
+ M. Universities Water Information Network (UWIN)
+ N. University of Texas Department of Economics Gopher
11. UNIVERSITY AND RESEARCH LIBRARY CARD CATALOGS
A. Research Libraries in General
* B. Library of Congress
C. North Carolina State University's "Library Without Walls"
* 12. PROGRAM LIBRARIES
A. Netlib
B. Statlib
C. Univ. of Illinois at Chicago Statistical Library
+ D. Guide to Available Mathematical Software (GAMS)
13. EDUCATIONAL SERVICES
* A. Iowa Electronic Markets
14. USENET NEWSGROUPS
15. MAILING LISTS
A. Introduction
* B. Single Topic Mailing Lists
* C. Financial Economists Network (FEN)
16. DATA RELATED TO THE ECONOMICS PROFESSION
A. Graduate Programs
+ B. Directory of Economists on the Internet
17. WORD PROCESSING
A. TeX References
B. TeX Macros for Economics and TeX Sources
18. PROGRAMS FOR ECONOMISTS ON THE INTERNET
* A. BCI Data Manager Version 2.0
19. USEFUL BOOKS, PROGRAMS, AND RESOURCES ABOUT THE INTERNET
* A. Books
* B. On-Line Guide
C. Software
D. Resources
20. NON-INTERNET RESOURCES
A. Introduction
B. Federal Reserve Bank Bulletin Boards
C. On-Line Refereed Economics Journal
0. NOTE
+ Working with Bob Parks and Hal Varian, I'll be converting this
+ into a hypertext html document later this summer. If you have
+ any comments, or would like a copy of it, please contact me.
+ Experienced Internet users will be glad to know that I'll move
+ to standard URLs at that time.
1. INTRODUCTION
This document, which is updated every two months or so, and its
successors, can be found in several places. They include, via ftp,
rtfm.mit.edu:/pub/usenet/sci.econ.research/econ-resources-faq and,
via gopher, at the Economics Working Paper Archive at Washington
University at St. Louis and the Economics Gopher at Sam
Houston State University (both are described below). Finally,
I'd be happy to send it out via email to all who request it.
This is my sixth stab at this document. I am very interested
in any corrections, suggestions, omissions, and hints anyone
might have. An abridged version will be appearing in the summer
issue of The Journal of Economic Perspectives along with a description
of Internet tools. Thus, any suggestions you might have will reach
a large audience.
While relatively few economists use the Internet, there is a
surprising amount of very useful information on it. For instance,
there are two very extensive sets of U.S. macro data, detailed
data from the Fed and the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, a
bibliography of some 35,000 working papers in economics, household
surveys from 21 countries, numerous interactive electronic markets,
more than 50 mailing lists and two Usenet newsgroups.
I apologize for any crosslistings. However, it appears that
economists use many different lists, so to reach the broadest
audience, crosspostings are unavoidable.
Some of the information is not as complete as I would wish.
Further, some of the resources I have not investigated
thoroughly and I cannot vouch for them. While I catalog many
mailing lists, I have little information about the volume and
types of discussions.
Most of the resources I was able to find deal with the United
States. Leads on information on other countries would be
appreciated.
I would like to acknowledge many people who have commented and
made suggestions on previous versions of this document. Without
their help, there would be fewer resources listed and the existing
descriptions would be more difficult to read. In particular, I
would like to thank Forrest Smith for suggesting I undertake this
project, and Thomas Krichel, George D. Greenwade and Bob Parks for
constant suggestions. More generally, I have received help from
Mona Andersen, Kit Baum, Larry Blume, Chris Birchenhall, Eric
Branckaert, Francis Buckley, Christian Burks, Nauro Campos, David
Chester, Alex Deacon, Karen Ewens, Daniel Feenberg, Gary Ferrier,
Matthew Flynn, Joe Friedman, James R. Garven, Gerhard Gonter, Seth
Greenblatt, Dave Hartland, Christian Helmenstein, Doug Henwood, Joe
Hirschburg, Brad Humphreys, Prue Hyman, Alan G. Isaac, Peter M.
Joftis, Nicholas Karatjas, Grace Katagiri, Ray Kiddy, Michael Kosz,
Gary F. Langer, Denise Lievesley, Jeffrey K. MacKie-Mason, Wayne
Marr, Clive Massey, Ken Miller, Ty B. Mitchell, Peter Mitter,
Mathias Moersch, Keith Morgan, Raleigh Muns, Henry Ohlsson, Ron
Overman, Tim Parker, Richard Porter, Karl B. Radov, Shyamala Raman,
Terry Rephann, Rob Raisch, Phil Roan, Ken Rogers, Larry Rosenburg,
Lauri Saarinen, Terry Schroepfer, Glen Segell, Ajay Shaw, Ross Shaw,
Jack Siler, George Slotsve, Timothy Smeeding, Una Smith, Kim Sosin,
Johannes Strasser, George Tauchen, Sailesh Tanna, Michael Thoen, Hal
Varian, Edward Vielmetti, Larry W. Virden, Daniel Weinberg, Larry
Weiser, David Wildasin, Sam Williamson, Stephen Yeo, Edith Wu, Grace
York.
Notes:
- Items in " " are typed directly as commands.
- Unless otherwise stated, FTP means anonymous FTP.
- I give directions for gopher in what I call direct and
indirect methods. Some gopher client software allows you
to "point" at a gopher site (the direct method), while other
software does not, so you have to navigate through
gopherspace (the indirect method). With the indirect
method, you must first find the gopher directory devoted
to what is usually titled "Other Gophers" (generally in the
top or next to top menu).
- Many of the gophers devoted to economics are interconnected;
no mention is made of this below since it would take a lot
of space to say who is connected to whom. The gophers at Sam
Houston State University, the Economics Department at
Washington University in St. Louis and RiceInfo seem to have
the greatest number of interconnections.
- For both gophers and anonymous FTP sites, the location is
given as host:directory. Thus, in the directions for EconData,
you'll see the FTP site given as info.umd.edu:/info/EconData.
This means that you do an anonymous ftp to info.umd.edu and
change to the /info/EconData directory (be sure to preserve
case when typing).
- For World Wide Web resources, Uniform Resource Locators
(URL) are used to denote their location. They have the form
resource://host:#/directory. A future version of this
document will employ this increasingly popular standard.
- Information about compressed files, converting binary files
to text so they can be emailed and converted back to binary,
and locations on gopher software can be found in the section
titled USEFUL BOOKS, PROGRAMS, AND RESOURCES ABOUT THE INTERNET.
2. NEW IN THIS VERSION
New resources in this draft are denoted with a + in the first
column, while changes to resources mentioned previously are denoted
with a * in the first column.
Major new entries in this draft include the FDIC, the U.S. Census
Bureau, Statistics Canada, the Economic Report of the President,
the first electronic economics journal on the Internet (the
Cyberchronicle of Political Economy), the first journal archive
of a paper journal on the Internet (from the Journal of Business
and Economic Statistics), and indirectly, the Economic Literature
Index.
Finally, parts of this document have been reorganized.
3. U.S. MACRO AND REGIONAL DATA
* A. Economic Bulletin Board (EBB)
This service is an outgrowth of a dial-up bulletin board
offered by the U.S. Department of Commerce. It contains
more than 2,000 files from the Departments of Commerce,
Labor and Treasury, the Federal Reserve and other agencies.
The EBB is currently offered on the Internet in two places.
The first is a telnet interface to the EBB at the Department
of Commerce, and the second is at a library gopher at the
University of Michigan.
EBB at the Commerce Department
This resource began charging for their services on Oct. 1.
Charges for Internet telnet access follow.
Timed Charges:
Annual subscription fee $45
Credit for connect charges $20
8AM - noon (Eastern) $24/hour
noon - 6PM $18/hour
6PM - 8AM (& holidays, $6/hour
weekends)
Flat Fees
Up to 1 hour/day $250/year
Up to 4 hours/day $400/year
The current telent interface is basically that used for the dial-
up bulletin board. Thus, one must capture on the information
from the screen or use a bulletin board type download (such
as Kermit). I have not tried the later and can offer no advice.
To capture all screen data on a Unix system, one can do
"telnet ebb.stat-usa.gov | tee ebb.data"
where tee takes the screen data and places it in the file
ebb.data.
FTP and gopher access may be available at this time; plans
were to charge by the amount transferred.
Limited guest accounts are available, use "guest" as the
password. You are limited to 20 minutes of connection time
and not all files are available.
Most information is in four areas: the bulletin system (which
describes how to use the system), the file system (which
contains files), the trade promotion system,and the utilities
system (which sets passwords, terminal types, etc.) Basic
information on the system can be found in the bulletin system
(entered by typing "B") under "3", while a listing of files can
be found in the file listing system (entered by typing "L")
under 17.
Data comes in several formats. Some comes in DOS self
extracting files, some in .PRN (so it can be used in
spreadsheets or software that can import spreadsheet data),
and some in a specialized format.
+ Gary Langer's BCI Data Manager, described below, is a Windows
+ 3.1 program that lets you manage this database.
TELNET: ebb.stat-usa.gov
EBB at the University of Michigan Library Gopher
The University manually downloads files daily from the dial-
up EBB. It is said to contain 700 files; I have no information
on the different numbers of files contained by the two
versions of the EBB. Information on file formats and the
system in general can be found under the heading "Current
Business Statistics" and "EBB and Agency Information and
misc. files." As with the Commerce Department location,
data comes in several different forms. A convenient listing of
all directories for the EBB can be found in a file called
"Contents of the Ulibrary Gopher" at the "University of
Michigan Libraries" (described below).
One good educational use of this gopher is recent press
releases concerning economic statistics. I frequently use
it just before class to check the most recent numbers.
The directory directly above EBB at the University of Michigan
contains a variety of useful information.
+ Again, Gary Langer's BCI Data Manager, described below, is a
* Windows 3.1 program that lets you manage this database.
TELNET: una.hh.lib.umich.edu (login as "gopher" and move
to /Social Science Resources/Economics)
GOPHER (direct): una.hh.lib.umich.edu /socsci/Economics
GOPHER (indirect): USA/Michigan/University of Michigan
Libraries/Social Science Resources/Economics
* B. EconData
This database, collected by INFORUM, a project building an
inter-industry model of the U.S. economy, processes a wide
variety of macro data and places it in a common format. Data
includes the National Income and Product Accounts, balance
* of payments, flow of funds, CPI, PPI, the Penn World Trade
* Tables, blue pages from the Survey of Current Business, and
* state and local data including employment, earnings, GSP and
* state personal income. International data from the IMF and
* World Bank is available, but permission must be obtained from
* them. One hopes, that with time, this will change.
The data is accessed by programs (only for Pcs) provided by
this project and it can easily be output to ASCII or into a
spreadsheet format. The data is also compressed with pkzip,
and they provide this and similar programs as well.
For introductory information, see "Instruction/contents.doc"
and "Instructions/guide.doc".
The program that retrieves data (PDG) is relatively
straightforward, but let me add my own experiences. First,
you may need to change the path to the help files in the
g.cfg file. Assuming that you're in a directory with one
of the unzipped data files, start the program by typing
"pdg". Then, a return will allow you to start normally.
The command "look" allows one to survey the data in that
file (additional commands are found on the bottom of the
screen that allow you to print the data to the screen or
graph it). One leaves the look command with an escape. To
print the data to an external file in columns, use the
"matty" command. After typing "matty" and the full file
name you choose, you'll be prompted for the series names
that can be obtained with "look". Don't separate series
names with commas and be sure to end the command with a
semicolon. The output of matty lists dates in the first
column, but you'll need to modify the fractions used to
denote months and quarters. Finally, you can easily plot
data to the screen to get an approximate idea of what it
looks like.
TELNET: info.umd.edu (login as "gopher" and move to
/Educational Resources/Economic Data)
GOPHER (direct): info.umd.edu:/Educational
Resources/Economic Data
GOPHER (indirect): USA/Maryland/University of Maryland
/Resources/Economic Data
FTP: info.umd.edu:/info/EconData
* C. Bureau of Labor Statistics (LABSTAT)
This site offers very detailed data in a number of areas.
Quoting from their documentation, they include:
Average Price Data
Collective Bargaining-State & Local Gov't
Collective Bargaining-Private Sector
Consumer Price Index-All Urban Consumers
Consumer Price Index-Urban Wage Earners and Clerical Workers
Employee Benefits Survey
Employment Cost Index
Employment, Hours, & Earnings-National
International Price Index
Special Export Comparison Index
Employment Projections by Industry
Geographic Profile
Occupational Injury & Illness Rates
International Labor Statistics
Local Area Unemployment Statistics
Department Store Inventory Price Index
Major Sector Multifactor Productivity Index
Producer Price Index Revision-Current Series
Producer Price Index Revision-Discontinued Series
Federal Government Productivity Index
Industry Labor Productivity Index
Major Sector Productivity & Costs Index
State & Area Employment, Hours, & Earnings
Occupational Injury and Illness Rates
Producer Price Index
Work Stoppage Data
Data is generally quite disaggregated; overall, there are many
megabytes of files. Besides historical data, recent press releases
are available.
All data is in the pub directory, which contains a further
three directories: doc, news.release, and time.series. For
a short introduction, read the README file in the pub directory,
while information on how the files are stored is located in
the overview.doc file in the doc directory.
In general, the news releases in the news.releases directory
are quite useful for tracking current events, while the great
* amount of detail in the actual time series will be of quite
* useful for many researchers.
* FTP: stats.bls.gov
INFORMATION (on Internet access): labstat.helpdesk@bls.gov
INFORMATION (on data issues): see the contact.doc in /pub/doc
* D. Federal Reserve
To paraphrase from the README file for this information,
this data is from PC disks made available by the Board of
Governors and placed on the Internet by the Internet
Multicasting Service (which, among other things, helps
run EDGAR and the Internet's own "radio" show, "Geek of
the Week.").
In general, the data is quite extensive and detailed. Most
dates back a number of years. All is in ASCII form, but some
of the columns widths are more than 80 characters and some of
the names are less than intuitive. As always, be sure to read
all the information provided in the various help files.
All data is in the fed directory. Quoting from the README
file in that directory, the data is in the following directories:
flow Flow of funds tables.
g_17 Industrial production and capacity utilization.
g_17_his Industrial production and capacity utilization.
h_3 Reserves of depository institutions.
h_4_2 Weekly series on assets and liabilities of
large commercial banks.
h_15 Selected interest rates.
money Money stock measures and components.
others Other Federal Reserve data tables.
Each directory contains many files and some even contain other
directories of data. In each, there are several compressed files
in different formats (denoted with different filename suffixes)
with that directory's files. Each directory also contains a file
with information on the data in that directory (the names of these
files vary).
+ GOPHER: gopher.town.hall.org/Federal Reserve Board
+ WWW: http://www.town.hall.org/Federal Reserve Board Data
FTP: town.hall.org:/other/fed
E. New England Electronic Economic Data Center (NEEEDc)
This database, the bulletin board of the Federal Reserve
Bank of Boston, specializes in data on the New England
economy. It carries all historical data published in the
Federal Reserve Bank of Boston's New England Economic
Indicators (some 90 variables from 1969 for all states and
some metropolitan areas) and GSP data for the New England
area from the Bureau of Economic Analysis. The data is in
.PRN format, so it can be read directly by Lotus or
Quatro.
FTP: neeedc.umesbs.maine.edu
INFORMATION: Jim Breece (breece@maine.maine.edu)
+ F. Economic Report of the President
+
+ This electronic version of the Economic Report of the President
+ is from the U.S Department of Commerce's quarterly CD-ROM product,
+ the National, Economic, Social, & Environmental Data Bank (NESE DB),
+ which is distributed to all Government Depository Libraries. Since,
+ apparently like all U.S. government information, it is not
+ copyrightable, it may be copied for further distribution. In this
+ case, the Univ. of Missouri at St. Louis has placed this information
+ on their Gopher.
+
+ Besides the text of the document, it also contains graphics files
+ of the graphs and Lotus spreadsheet files of the very useful data
+ in this document. Apparently, a few of the spreadsheet files are
+ corrupted, but this appears to stem from problems with the original CD,
+ not problems with transferring the data from the CD to this Gopher site.
+
+ Currently, this site contains the reports from 1992 and 1993, and
+ the report for 1994 is expected soon.
+
+ GOPHER: umslvma.umsl.edu/The Library/Government Information
+ /Economic Reports of the President
+ INFORMATION: gopher-l@umslvma.umsl.edu
+ G. Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia
+
+ Currently, this site it offers regional information about the area
+ this Bank covers, but in the future, it should contain more information,
+ particularly about the work of the research staff.
+
+ GOPHER: simon.wharton.upenn.edu
4. OTHER U.S. DATA
A. National Archives Center for Electronic Records
The National Archives has a branch devoted to the storage
of electronic records from many federal entities. Of
interest to economists are records from the Bureaus of the
Census, Economic Analysis, and Labor Statistics, the Civil
Aeronautics Board, Department of Transportation, IRS, SEC,
and Social Security Administration. While the records are
not available over the Internet (at least not yet),
detailed information about them, including a listing of
"data files" and ordering information for the data files
(generally available only on 9-track tape reels or 3480
tape cartridges) are available. Currently, some 6,200 data
files out of more than 14,000 available are listed in a
rapidly growing list. Some of the data files are old,
while some are relatively recent. Some entities have only
a small selection of data, while for others, the listings
are more complete. Unfortunately, the tapes are
relatively expensive at either $80.75 or $90.00 (depending
upon the medium) with additional tapes at $24.50. One can
hope that a less expensive on-line database is not too far
in the future. Since a comprehensive list of files here is
impossible, the interested researcher should examine
them. Much more information about this service can be
found in the directory listed below.
FTP: ftp.cu.nih.gov:/NARA_ELECTRONIC
Directions: anonymous FTP, but press
the return key for the password
B. Social Security Administration (OSS-IS)
The Social Security Administration Office Support System
Information Server (OSS-IS) recently has placed their
internal system on the Internet as an experiment. Data
includes monthly benefits, current operating statistics,
history of benefits paid and income data on the aged. Key
files are "index" which describes the files available,
and "orsindex_txt," which describes files from the SSA's
Office of Research and Statistics, which are likely to be
of the most interest for economists. Using these files,
one can fairly quickly locate the desired data.
The email interface comes from Netlib, so an introduction
can be obtained by sending email to the address listed
below with "send index" in the body of the message. For
FTP, the files "index" and "orsindex_txt" are available in
the "pub" directory.
E-MAIL: info@ssa.gov
FTP: soaf1.ssa.gov:/pub
INFORMATION: info@ssa.gov
* C. FedWorld
This site provides an entry-way from the Internet to many
U.S. Government Bulletin Board Systems (BBS) that one
usually contacts via a phone and modem at (703) 321-8020.
While there is relatively little material directly related to
economics that cannot be obtained more directly, it is a useful
connection to many databases. Access is only through telnet.
TELNET: fedworld.gov
* FTP: ftp.fedworld.gov
D. Public Domain Financial Data
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
and a list of the extensive set of files at this site can
be found in the file named "ls-lR".
FTP: dg-rtp.dg.com:/pub/misc.invest
E. Census Data
A common site for U.S. and some Canadian Census
information is located at this gopher. This gopher
provides links to other gophers that actually contain the
data. The material is not coordinated, so some searching
may be in order. I was particularly impressed with the
collection at the University of Missouri - they have data
for all U.S. counties and cities.
GOPHER (direct): riceinfo.rice.edu:/Information
by Subject Area/Census
GOPHER (indirect): USA/Texas/RiceInfo
* F. EDGAR (SEC)
This database opened in January. It covers fillings by U.S.
public companies made to the SEC. It covers such things as 10K,
10Q, annual, quarterly reports and many other items. In all,
the SEC receives 10 million pages a year of such data. Plans
were for 3,000 companies to file electronically into EDGAR by
the end of 1993, with all 15,000 companies required to file
with the SEC eventually required to file into EDGAR.
Previously, this database was available only through Mead Data
in either inconvenient locations or at very considerable
expense. In an experiment, it is now be available at no cost
over the Internet. This service is provided and funded by the
NSF, the NYU Stern School of Business, and the Internet
Multicasting Service, run by Carl Malamud, an economist at the
Board of Governors.
This database only covers fillings made in 1994 for public
consumption, when made electronically by the filling company.
Thus, it does not cover earlier years, current paper fillings
or non-public ones. Even so, the data is extensive; there appear
to be more than 6,000 fillings for January alone.
As the experiment progresses, there will be many changes in the
design of the database (for instance, a World Wide Web
interface is envisioned). Be sure to read the file general.txt
in the main directory for the latest information. Currently,
the files form.idx and company.idx in the main directory list
the fillings. The first is ordered by the type of form, and the
second by the company (both contain the same information, just
in different order). Entries in both of these files list the file
in the data1 directory with the relevant filling.
+ GOPHER: gopher.town.hall.org/SEC EDGAR
+ WWW: www.town.hall.org/SEC EDGAR Documents
FTP: town.hall.org/edgar
EMAIL: mail@town.hall.org (send HELP in the body to receive info)
INFORMATION: edgar-interest@town.hall.org (mailing list on edgar; to
subscribe to it, send email to: edgar-interest-request
@town.hall.org)
G. U.S. Department of Agriculture Economic Research Service
This project is jointly sponsored by the Mann Library at
Cornell University and the Economic Research Service of the
U.S. Department of Agriculture. It contains more than 140 data
sets, and more are due to be added. These data sets cover a
very wide range of agricultural topics, and even include
international and climate data. They are frequently quite detailed,
and are mostly in Lotus 1-2-3 .WK1 format (thus, if you transfer
them with FTP, be sure to use the binary mode). Gopher is the
preferred connection method (files cannot be transferred with
Telnet unless your Telnet client can call FTP).
TELNET: usda.mannlib.cornell.edu (login as "usda")
GOPHER (direct): usda.mannlib.cornell.edu
GOPHER (indirect): USA/New York/Cornell University, Albert R. Mann
University Library
FTP: usda.mannlib.cornell.edu:/usda
INFORMATION: Oya Y. Rieger (oyr1@cornell.edu).
+ H. Martin Wong's and George Holt's Market Report
+
+ This report briefly describes the day's activities in various
+ financial markets. It first starts out with a short summary by
+ Martin Wong, then more detailed information is provided by George
+ Holt. The former includes the day's major activities in financial
+ markets and releases of key economic data, while the later has an
+ extensive report on many markets (NYSE, NASDAQ, AMEX, foreign
+ markets, interest rates, foreign exchange, etc.). The later is
+ also available from the mailing list eINVEST.
+
+ TELNET: a2i.rahul.net (login as "guest", use "n", then enter
+ our terminal type, then move to
+ "Current System Information" then to
+ "Market Report")
+ I. Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC)
+
+ This site contains extensive statistical information on the
+ banking system in the U.S., as well as some information for
+ consumers on deposit insurance and dealing with bank failures.
+ In addition, there is information for librarians and researchers
+ on all statistical publications by the FDIC.
+
+ Statistical information is from "The Statistics on Banking." There
+ are issues for 1934-1992, for 1991, and 1992. Most data is
+ in Lotus 123 .WK1 format. There are numerous help files that
+ explain the holdings.
+
+ GOPHER: fdic.sura.net port 71
+ FTP: nic.sura.net/pub/fdic
+ J. U.S. Census Bureau
+
+ This official site of the Census Bureau currently offers
+ considerable information about the Census Bureau, press releases,
+ and links to other Census sites on the Internet through its
+ Gopher. For the moment, perhaps the most useful information from
+ this site can be obtained from the Data Extraction System, DES
+ (formerly known as SIPP -- Survey of Income and Program
+ Participation). DES allows one to make extractions from large
+ surveys. For economists, the most useful survey one can make
+ extractions from is the Current Population Survey. Output from the
+ extractions can come in several different formats (ASCII, Ingress,
+ and several SAS formats) in several different methods, including
+ email and ftp.
+
+ To access the DES system, one telnets to gateway.census.gov,
+ logs on with the username of "desuser", and simply presses the
+ return key when prompted for the password. The DES system is
+ fairly easy to navigate, with the possible exception that one
+ moves back up a menu by pressing the Q key (for quit).
+
+ Plans are plans to put additional surveys in the DES system.
+
+ GOPHER: gopher.census.gov
+ FTP: ftp.census.gov
+ WWW: http://www.census.gov
+ INFORMATION: gatekeeper@census.gov
5. WORLD AND NON-U.S. DATA
A. Luxembourg Income Study (LIS)
This project brings together 66 household surveys from 21
countries 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.
The average survey has approximately 9,000 households with
more than 20,000 members. 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 an annual database of 100 macro indicators
available on floppy disks to put the household surveys in
context. This database also contains rules on taxes and
transfers in each country to make international comparison
meaningful.
The datasets are well documented, and workshops and
newsletters help the researcher to use this complex
database.
INFORMATION: Tim Smeeding (smeeding@suvm.bitnet)
Caroline de Tombeur (eplisjr@luxcep11.bitnet)
* B. Vienna Stock Market
Data from the Vienna Stock market is available via telnet.
I understand that it includes same day prices and volumes
and retains this data for a couple of months. The language
is German.
TELNET: fiivs01.tu-graz.ac.at (login as "BOERSE")
* GOPHER (direct): olymp.wu-wien.ac.at
