Quarterly retail e-commerce sales are estimated from the same sample used for the Monthly Retail Trade Survey (MRTS) to estimate preliminary and final U.S. retail sales. Coverage includes all retailers whether or not they are engaged in e-commerce. Online travel services, financial brokers and dealers, and ticket sales agencies are not classified as retail and are not included in either the total retail or retail e-commerce sales estimates.
The Annual Retail Trade Survey (ARTS) produces national estimates of total annual sales, e-commerce sales, end-of-year inventories, inventory-to-sales ratios, purchases, total operating expenses, inventories held outside the United States, gross margins, and end-of-year accounts receivable for retail businesses and annual sales and e-commerce sales for accommodation and food service firms located in the U.S.
To provide broad and timely measures of combined changes in business sales and end-of-month inventories for domestic retail trade, wholesale trade and manufacturers' activities.
The e-commerce measures report the value of goods and services sold online whether over open networks such as the Internet, or over proprietary networks running systems such as Electronic Data Interchange (EDI). E-commerce data were collected in four separate Census Bureau surveys. These surveys used different measures of economic activity such as shipments for manufacturing, sales for wholesale and retail trade, and revenues for service industries. Consequently, measures of total economic and e-commerce activity vary by economic sector, are conceptually and definitionally different, and therefore, are not additive.
The Business Expenses Supplement (BES) compiles statistics on business operating expenses during the Economic Census year. Detailed operating expenses are collected for Wholesale Distributors, Retail Trade, Accomodation and Food Services, Manufacturing, Construction, and Mining. Business expenses data are used routinely by government program officials, particularly the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis which uses the data for the Nation's Gross Domestic Product (GDP) estimates and in developing the National Accounts input-output tables. Other users of business expenses data include market researchers, economic analysts, academics and business owners.
The Quarterly Services Survey (QSS) is the only source of service industry indicator performance providing timely estimates of revenue and expenses for selected service industries. The Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) is the primary Federal user of data collected in the QSS. The BEA utilizes this timely data to factor into the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) to make improvements to the national accounts for service industries. QSS estimates also provide the Federal Reserve Board (FRB) and Council of Economic Advisors (CEA) with timely information on current economic performance. The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) use the QSS data to develop hospital-spending estimates in the National Accounts. In addition, the QSS data improves their ability to analyze hospital-spending trends.
The Annual Survey of State and Local Government Finances provides statistics on revenue, expenditure, debt, and assets (cash and security holdings) for governments. There are statistics for the 50 states and the District of Columbia, as well as a national summary. Statistics are also available by level of government -- state, local, and state plus local aggregates.
The Annual Survey of State Government Finances provides a comprehensive summary of the annual survey findings for state governments, as well as data for individual states. The tables contain detail of revenue by type, expenditure by object and function, indebtedness by term, and assets by purpose.