Business Data for You
The U.S. Census Bureau measures America's people, places and economy. They provide a wealth of statistics that are essential resources to help businesses in your area succeed and grow.
Business Programs
Economic Indicators
Provides monthly and quarterly data that are timely, reliable, and offer comprehensive measures of the U.S. Economy. These statistics cover construction, housing, international trade, retail trade, wholesale trade, services and manufacturing. census.gov/economic-indicators
International Trade
Provides monthly and annual data on imports and exports of goods and services at the state, district and port levels. Data are shown by industry, commodity and country for certain types of businesses. census.gov/trade
Quarterly Workforce Indicators
Provides quarterly workforce data for employer businesses at the local area level. lehd.ces.census.gov/data/#qwi
County Business Patterns
Provides annual data on number of businesses, employment and payroll for employer businesses down to the County level for all types of businesses. Also includes business counts by Zip Code. census.gov/programs-surveys/cbp/data.html
Nonemployer Statistics
Provides annual data on number of firms and revenue for nonemployer businesses (including independent contractors) down to the County level for certain types of businesses. census.gov/programs-surveys/nonemployer-statistics.html
Statistics of U.S. Businesses
Provides annual enterprise-level data on business births, deaths, expansions and contractions at the national and state levels for most types of businesses.
census.gov/programs-surveys/susb.html
Survey of Business Owners, Annual Survey of Entrepreneurs and (new) Annual Business Survey
These programs publish data based on the race, ethnicity, gender and veteran status of the business owner. SBO publishes these data every five years for nearly every type of employer and nonemployer business down to the county level. The ASE provides similar data as SBO but annually and with less detail. The new ABS will combine these two programs with data from the Business R&D and Innovation for Microbusinesses survey. census.gov/programs-surveys/sbo.html, census.gov/programs-surveys/ase.html, and census.gov/programs-surveys/abs/about.html
Public Sector
Includes info on the financial activities of state and local governments such as revenues, expenditures, debts and assets; federal spending; and employment for all levels of government. census.gov/govs
Key Data Tools Census Business Builder
The Census Business Builder (CBB) is a suite of services that provide selected demographic and economic data from the Census Bureau tailored to specific types of users in a simple to acces and use format.
Key Features
- Easy to use menus and Search tools to select the location you'd like to research and nearly all types of businesses
- Interactive maps to browse and download data about the selected area and type of businesses
- Optimized for your smartphone or tablet
Data Included
- Demographic, socioeconomic, and housing data from the American
Community Survey - Business data from the County Business Patterns, Non-employer Statistics, Economic Census, and Survey of Business Owners
- Imports and Exports data from the
International Trade program - Consumer Spending data from Esri
- Agriculture data from the Census of Agriculture (USDA)
- Workforce data from the Quarterly Workforce Indicators
- Your own data (via Excel file upload feature)
census.gov/data/data-tools/cbb.html