* Bureau of Labor Statistics (LABSTAT)

LABSTAT is a very extensive and detailed dataset. In all, it contains hundreds of thousands of time series. Currently, there are two interfaces to it: the web and a gopher/ftp one. Material is still be added to the web site, but it is much easier for new users.

To be specific (and quoting from their documentation), this site's data includes:

• 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 on the gopher and ftp sites are organized by the above categories; the web site uses a different organization, but when completed, will have the same material. Data is generally quite disaggregated; overall, there are many megabytes of files.

Besides current and historical data, press releases are available as well.

As you'd expect, the web site is easier to use. In fact, you can easily select one or more time series, output in different formats, from their vast holdings through a conveint and easy-to-use series of web forms. This forms retrieval mechanism, called "selective access" exists not only for the general holdings, but also for frequently requested series (such as the CPI or the unemployment rate). More experienced users can directly retrieve a series with the BLS series id. The web site also offers news releases and a summary of the current state of the economy.

For ftp access, all data is in the "pub" directory, which contains four directories: "doc", "news.release", "special requests," and "time.series". For a short introduction, see the "README" file in the "pub" directory. Information on how the files are stored is located in the "overview.doc" file in the "doc" directory.

The "special requests" directory contains either (i) subsets of larger file partitions, or (ii) datasets with alternate partitioning schemes. They are done, as you'd expect, on request. The service is offered at the discretion of the BLS.

In general, news releases in directory are quite useful for tracking current events, while the great amount of detail in the actual time series will be quite useful for many researchers.

The gopher is organized similarly to the ftp site.

• http://stats.bls.gov/blshome.html
• gopher://stats.bls.gov:70/1/
• ftp://stats.bls.gov
• Information (on Internet access): labstat.helpdesk@bls.gov
• Information (on data issues): see the contact.doc in /pub/doc