UWM Libraries Research and Course Guides: Global Studies: Find data & statistics

Datasets

Social Explorer
Interactive tool that combines modern and historical US census and demographic data with an intuitive map interface, 1790 to present.
Census Data
The U.S. Census Bureau interface for distributing the Decennial Census of Population and Housing, the Economic Census, the American Community Survey, annual economic surveys, and other upcoming major related statistical files. This site is the primary source for the Census and the current economic census reports. The site is updated regularly with new data as it becomes available to the public.
Sage Data
Provides access to a wide variety of economic, social, and political indicators including data sets from the U.S. government, the International Monetary Fund, the World Trade Organization, the OECD, Eurostat, the United Nations, the world's stock exchanges, and Zillow. Offers customized graphing and mapping.
World Bank Open Data
The World Bank's Open Data initiative is intended to provide all users with access to World Bank data, including more than 2,000 financial, business, health, economic and human development indicators for over 200 countries, with some of the data going back 50 years. The Data Catalog lists available World Bank data sources, such as World Development Indicators. This listing will continue to be updated as additional data resources are added. These resources include databases, pre-formatted tables and reports. Each of the listings includes a description of the data source and a direct link to that source. Where possible, the databases are linked directly to a selection screen to allow users to select the countries, indicators, and years they would like to search. Those search results can be exported in different formats. Users can also choose to download the entire database directly from the catalog.
Data.gov
Data.gov provides access to federal, state and local open datasets. Search or browse non-sensitive government data and tools in a variety of formats, covering topics such as business, health, education, science, and much more.

Harvard Dataverse
The Harvard Dataverse Repository is a free data repository open to all researchers from any discipline, both inside and outside of the Harvard community, where you can share, archive, cite, access, and explore research data. Each individual Dataverse collection is a customizable collection of datasets (or a virtual repository) for organizing, managing, and showcasing datasets.
UN Human Development Index
The Human Development Index (HDI) is a summary measure of average achievement in key dimensions of human development: a long and healthy life, being knowledgeable and have a decent standard of living. The HDI is the geometric mean of normalized indices for each of the three dimensions.
World Bank Open Data
This site is designed to make World Bank data easy to find, download, and use. All of the data found here can be used free of charge with minimal restrictions. You can search for indicator names, countries, and topics.
Economic Census Data
All publications from economic censuses from 1967 onward are available online. Scanned images in PDF and other formats are available for publications from the 1967 to 1987 economic censuses via the search at archive.org.
World Values Survey
A global network of social scientists studying changing values and their impact on social and political life.
International Monetary Fund (IMF) Data
Data USA
Visualization tool for open U.S. Government data on geographic locations, occupations, industries, and more. Map, compare, and download data, e.g. median household income by state.
openFDA - U.S. Food and Drug Administration
e goal of the project is to create easy access to public data, to create a new level of openness and accountability, to ensure the privacy and security of public FDA data, and ultimately to educate the public and save lives. The concept was to index high-value, high priority and scalable public-access data, format and document that data in developer and consumer-friendly standards, and make that data available via a public-access portal that enables developers to quickly and easily use it in applications.
CDC Data and Statistics
From the Centers for Disease Control, browse by topic to locate data and statistics you need.

TRID: the TRIS and ITRD database
TRID is an integrated database that combines the records from TRB’s Transportation Research Information Services (TRIS) Database and the OECD’s Joint Transport Research Centre’s International Transport Research Documentation (ITRD) Database. TRID provides access to more than one million records of transportation research worldwide.

Statistical Sources

Europa World
Access ends July 31, 2025.
Europa World is the online version of the Europa World Year Book, the indispensable source of information on world-wide affairs. First published in 1926, the year book is renowned as one of the world's leading reference works, covering political and economic information in over 250 countries and territories, from Afghanistan to Zimbabwe.

United Nations Demographic and Social Statistics
The United Nations Statistics Division collects data on literacy, educational attainment and school attendance from national statistical offices around the world and disseminates them in tabular form in special issues of the United Nations Demographic Yearbook. The major sources of these statistics and indicators are the United Nations Statistics Division and the UNESCO Institute for Statistics (UIS) the statistical branch of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO).
Inter-University Consortium for Political and Social Research (ICPSR)
Archive of online original research data on social science topics. Create your own MyData personal account.
UWM is a member - contact is Dr. Lex Renda
History Department. renlex@uwm.edu

Direction of Trade Statistics
The Direction of Trade Statistics database from the IMF presents current figures on the value of merchandise exports and imports disaggregated according to a country's primary trading partners. Coverage includes over 180 countries, the world, and major areas.