State of the Nation

What Are the Major Areas?

The State of the Nation section consists of five major sub-sections:

-Economic News:  This section contains information about major updates.

-Today's HOT Releases:  This section itemizes the major files that are coming out this current business day, as well as the expected posting times.  This list changes each business day.  Links are provided so you can directly download the files.

-Daily Releases:  This section lists files that get updated every day as well as their expected posting times.  Files like the daily exchange rate, bond rate, and Treasury statements will be in here.

-Current Versions of America's Top 50 Releases:  Shown here are the fifty most popular files, divided into subject areas, in the State of the Nation library.  

-State of the Nation Library:  All of the roughly 3000 files in the State of the Nation section are made available in a full-text searchable data base.  If it's not in the Top 50 files, you'll have to go to this library to find it.



Finding Files

Popular files or those being updated today will typically be shown two or three times within the SOTN section:

Just about all files will appear in the "State of the Nation Library" (discussed later).  Note, however, that this library is updated on a periodic basis and files added today may not be updated in the library until the next morning. Major files that are updated today will also be listed in either the "Today's HOT Releases" or "Daily Releases" section.   The most popular files on the service will be listed in the "Current Versions of America's Top 50 Releases" section.

Using the SOTN Library is discussed later.   Once you find the file you're interested in, though, you will want to view it, download it to your hard drive, copy it into another application, and/or print it.  (See the appendix for a general discussion about viewing, printing, and downloading articles from the STAT-USA/Internet Web site.)



The State of the Nation Library

Only the most popular files are listed separately on the main State of the Nation (SOTN) page.  The rest are available under the SOTN Library.  To access the SOTN Library, click on the "SOTN Library" link at the top of the State of the Nation page or select it from the bottom of the same page.

In the SOTN Library, files are divided into categories which are listed on the left frame.  If you click on something like "Fiscal & Monetary Policy", the files in that area will be listed on the right frame. If you click on one of the items in the right frame, the file will be displayed (the same as if the file was listed individually under the "Top 50" file section.


Searching the Library

The most powerful feature for finding files, however, is to use the search option.  If necessary, use the scroll bar on the left frame to reveal the option "Search SOTN Library".  Click this.

To search the State of the Nation side of the site, remember the rules:

-Individual words:  Put in the word to search (like "gdp" or "travel"--do not use quotes!)

-Multiple words:   If you want to search for documents with two specific words in them and the words don't have to appear next to each other, put the words in with "and" between them (like "earnings and detroit"--again, no quotes)

-Phrases: .  If you have a multi-word phrase that you want to search for, enter it directly (like "consumer price index"--again, no quotes)

To view individual search results, click on the underlined file description on the right.  See the "Viewing/printing/downloading files" discussion in the Appendix.