Public Data and Statistics
Data is a valuable resource for research, academics, and strategic decision-making, which makes easy access to data incredibly important. A variety of public access data repositories concerning higher education are available for use in research and academics. Some of them include:
Federal Data Update (February 2025):
Like with any resource, we want to be critical and skeptical of the origin and intended purpose of information. Given changes in United States federal data access that began in January 2025, pre-2025 archived versions of federal data sets are available through these two resources:
- The Data Rescue (more user-friendly)
- Harvard's Data.gov Archive (involves some comfort with coding)
Federal Data Sets
The United States government public data portal is nearing 300,000 datasets and dataset collections in the catalog, harvested from over 100 organizations across health, education, and science.
The United States census offers data sets relevant to topical issues and demographics. The full archive of pre-2025 data sets are available here.
Center for Disease Control (CDC)
Public data sets relevant to health, infection, medicine, and disease.
Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD)
Public data sets on housing, residential finance, market rents, rental assistance, homeowner assistance, tax credits, homelessness, and more.
Department of Agriculture (USDA)
Public data sets ranging from agricultural trade to genetically modified produce.
Transportation Statistics Data Portal
Access to detailed transportation data from hundreds of travel and transit surveys and studies.
Substance Use and Mental Health
A multitude of data sets concerning substance use, abuse, and mental health.
U.S. Government Data Sets
Federal Data Update (February 2025):
Like with any resource, we want to be critical and skeptical of the origin and intended purpose of information. Given changes in United States federal data access that began in January 2025, pre-2025 archived versions of federal data sets are available through these two resources:
- The Data Rescue (more user-friendly)
- Harvard's Data.gov Archive (involves some comfort with coding)
U.S. Federal Government Resources
Social Explorer: Explore over 500,000 data indicators and over 220 years of data for the United States from present to 1790, including all Decennial Censuses, American Community Surveys and many other datasets.
U.S. Government Publishing Office Federal Digital System: GPO’s Federal Digital System (FDsys) provides free online access to official publications from all three branches of the Federal Government.
Center for Disease Control: Pre-2025 data and statistics from the Center for Disease Control.
U.S. Government Budget Fiscal Year 2025: Details governmental budget allocations and priorities for the fiscal year.
ProQuest Congressional: Covers abstracts and indexing for hearings, reports, documents and committee prints.
USA.gov: This website allows you to discover government information and services by topic.
U.S. Census: This portal will connect you to information related to the last census.
Congress.gov: The legislation collection includes records for every bill and resolution introduced in the U.S. Congress.
House Ways and Means Committee Green Book: Green Book provides data and other information on federal programs within the purview of the House Ways and Means Committee, which includes social security and child care services.
State Government Resources
Library of Congress State and Local Government Information: Provides detailed information on legal materials by state jurisdiction
Mass.gov: This website provides information on local state policies including housing, unemployment, and healthcare access.
Fiscal 50: State Trends & Analysis: An interactive web platform that offers context and details on states' fiscal health with regional benchmarks, state trends, and various data points.
