Business

A concise overview of a nation's economy, outlook and risks, current events, political structure, and other basic facts. Great, one-stop shopping for quick info.

To get started, select your country from the drop-down box, then hit the right-facing arrow to search.

This is an excellent source from the U.S. Department of Commerce that provides book-length reports on the practical information of how to do business with a particular nation. Topics include tariff information, distribution channels, investment climate, trade regulations, business travel, and leading sectors for U.S. exports.

Provides lots of quick statistics that shed insight into the standard of living across most nations in the world. Statistics include topics such as the percentage of Internet users, foreign direct investment, life expectancy, CO2 emissions, and federal debt. Under the "Topics" tab, there is statistical information on several topics, including infrastructure, effectiveness of aid, science, agriculture, and education.

The pages for each country have extensive economic reports and links from the IMF.

You can get country-by-country economic data for the 34 members of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development. Includes indicators in topics such as agriculture, economy, and jobs.

Concise profiles of the history, people, government, economy, geography, communications, transportation, military, and transnational issues for 266 world entities.

Provides information for the current year only.

This page will allow you to get archived editions of the CIA World Factbook if you wish to gather information from 1990 to one year ago.

Quick, practical overviews of countries evaluating the business environment

These comprehenive profiles cover facts about the land, people, history, government, political conditions, economy, and foreign relations of independant nations.

These statements are put out by the U.S. Department of State. They summarize the current issues, trends, and economic climate of particular countries as it relates to doing business.

Provides national trade import and export data by volume. You can specify US trade with a particular country or region. Use the "Trade within a Selected Market" to get data about a broad category of trade

This is a massive collection of free databases from the U.N. You can target a specific dataset, or do a mass search. Types of information available relate to economic development, human rights, energy resouces, commodities, labor, gender issues, and more.

This database will let you gather stats for Purchasing Power Parity (PPP) for 189 countries for the years 1950 to 2007.

Interesting data that lets you generate reports on a selected country to measure attitudes towards Risk Avoidance, Individualism, Achievement, Long-Term Orientation, and Power.

Survey reports from a variety of nations on popular topics.

Book-length information on the history, culture, and economy of most countries in the world.

Each entry describes the customs, attitudes, and heritage of a particular nation. Good for quick generalizations on issues like gender, family, religious, and other cultural factors of a country.

This website provides general overviews of how immigrant groups have lived and adjusted in the United States. Discusses significant immigration waves, patterns of settlement, acculturation, and traditions.

Huge collection of statistics that lets you compare two nations in terms of health, crime, environment, taxation, transportation, economy, and more than a dozen other criteria.

Hint: You can click on the criteria in the search results to link directly to the source where the information was gathered.