BEA Economic Areas
Aligning Workforce & Economic Information
Association of Public Data Users
APDU 2008 Annual Meeting
The Brookings Institution
Washington, DC
Duke Tran
Regional Product Division
U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis
Presentation Overview
 What are BEA Economic Areas?
 Who uses them?
 What is the plan for future redefinition?
 Needs for new data sources
www.bea.gov
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U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis
 Mission:
Promote a better understanding of the U.S. economy
by providing the most timely, relevant, and accurate economic
accounts data in an objective and cost-effective manner
 Role:
The Nation’s economic accountant for National,
International, Industry, and Regional accounts
 Products:
GDP, Personal Income, Corporate Profits, Balance of
Payments, Input-Output Tables, Travel and Tourism, etc.
www.bea.gov
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BEA’s Regional Accounts
 Role: Provide users a consistent framework to study
detailed geographic distribution of U.S. economic
activity and growth nationwide
 Products:
 GDP by State and Metropolitan Area
 Personal Income by State and Local Areas
 Economic Multipliers
 BEA Economic Areas
www.bea.gov
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What Are BEA Economic Areas?
 BEA Economic Areas define the relevant regional
markets surrounding metropolitan areas
 Each area consists of a central market area and
surrounding counties that are economically
related to the central area
 Current set, redefined in 2004, 179 areas
www.bea.gov
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Geography Hierarchy
 3,141 counties in the 2000 Census:
 OMB’s definition:
 Core Based Statistical Areas(939)
 Metropolitan Statistical Areas (363)
 Micropolitan Statistical Areas (576)
 Combined Statistical Areas (123)
 BEA Economic Areas:
 Component Economic Areas (344)
 BEA Economic Areas (179)
www.bea.gov
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The Process
www.bea.gov
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Benefits of Using BEA EA’s
 EAs provide a useful alternative geography to
metropolitan areas because EAs cover all
counties in the Nation
 EA’s county aggregations are useful for both
research and production purposes
www.bea.gov
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Uses of BEA Economic Areas
 BEA’s Regional program
 Other Federal government agencies
 Local and regional authorities
 Private and academic researchers
www.bea.gov
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The Challenge ─ Data Availability
 Availability: Elimination of the long form in the
2010 Census
 Alternative sources:
 American Community Survey
 Local Employment Dynamics
www.bea.gov
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American Community Survey (ACS)
 Replacing long form in the decennial censuses:
 Availability
 Geographies
 Using ACS to redefine BEA EAs:
 Benefits
 Challenges
www.bea.gov
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Local Employment Dynamics (LED)
 What is Local Employment Dynamics?
 LED’s tools and datasets
 LED’s data characteristics
www.bea.gov
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LED’s Benefits / Issues
BENEFITS
 Current
 Population vs. sample
 Integrated and
consistent
 Linkages to other data
www.bea.gov
ISSUES
 LED employment data
exclusions
 LED not yet national
in scope.
 LED partnership
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Next Steps
 Compare results from the new data sources
 Prepare analysis to address:
 ACS & LED strengths and weaknesses
 Geographic details
 Commuting home-to-work
 Socioeconomic characteristics
 Annual and multi-year data summaries
www.bea.gov
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More Information, Questions?
Duke Tran
Regional Product Division
U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis
Washington, DC 20230
202.606.9230
Duke.Tran@BEA.gov
www.bea.gov
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