Helen E. Teir, Chief, Statistical Compendia Staff, Data User Services Division, assisted by Glenn W. King, was responsible for general supervision and compilation. They were assisted in the research and analytical phases of assigned sections and in the developmental aspects of new tables by Elisabeth A. Busse, Lars B. Johanson, Rosemary E. Clark, and Edward C. Jagers, who was also responsible for content and preparation of graphic charts. Minerva K. Moreland was responsible for technical editorial supervision, assisted by Mary A. Rahall for editing and clerical operations. The cooperation of many contributors to this volume is gratefully acknowledged. The source note below each table credits the various government and private agencies which have collaborated in furnishing information for the Statistical Abstract. In a few instances, contributors have requested that their data be designated as subject to copyright restrictions, as indicated in the source notes to the tables affected. Permission to use copyright material should be obtained directly from the copyright owner. September 1979 Library of Congress Card No. 4-18089 SUGGESTED CITATION U.S. Bureau of the Census, Statistical Abstract of the United States: 1979. For sale by the Superintendent of Documents ington, D.C. 20402, Tel. (202) 783-3238 ~ office. Stock Number: 003-024-02129-3 Government Printing Office, Washpartment of Commerce district 130-7 (paper). 100 Editions of the Statistical Abstract STRAC of the United States 100% &e The first, or 1878, edition of the Statistical Abstract was issued in 1879. The Abstract has been issued every year since then except in 1927 and in 1944; the 1944 and 1945 editions were combined into one. From 1878 to 1902, the Abstract was issued by the Bureau of Statistics in the Treasury Department; from 1903 to 1911, by the same Bureau and for 1912, by the Bureau of Foreign and Domestic Commerce (BFDC), both in the Department of Commerce and Labor. From 1913 until the present, the Abstract has been a Department of Commerce responsibility; until 1937, within BFDC, and since 1938, within the Bureau of the Census. During its history the Abstract has grown almost steadily in number of tables and pages, in variety and scope of subject matter presented, in special features such as the Guide to Sources and the section on Recent Trends, and in supplements such as Historical Statistics of the United States, the County and City Data Book, and the Pocket Data Book, USA. The evolution of the Abstract to its current status as "the standard national inventory [which] leaves no part of our life untouched"1 and as the "mirror of America"2 was a slow journey. The content of the early editions of the Abstract strongly reflected the interest and responsibilities of its compiler, the Treasury Department. Imports and exports, public finance, ship tonnage and movement, and banking were the dominant subjects. Of the 154 pages of statistics in the 1878 edition, nearly three-fourths showed foreign trade and shipping data and most of the rest, public finance and banking. Data on population occupied a page and a fraction, and agriculture, 4 pages. Although twenty years later, the 1898 edition now comprised 425 pages of statistics and the variety of subjects was also considerably expanded, foreign trade data were still most prevalent (well over half), with public finance, banking, and shipping continuing to retain substantial shares. Significantly, however, population data, beginning with the 1894 edition, appear at the very front of the book and in the 1898 edition occupy 24 pages. Agriculture was then also better represented with about 15 pages of data showing selected crops and farm animals. Data on manufactures which had been introduced in the 1894 edition in a one-time summary from the 1890 census results were not included again until 1902. Aside from the "close-to-home" focus on Treasury Department data, what may have influenced the Abstract compilers to give scant attention and space to the data on population, agriculture, manufactures, etc., was their availability in both the regular voluminous reports of the censuses and, even better, in such handier summary volumes as the Compendium of the Tenth Census (1880), the Abstract of the Eleventh Census (1890), and the Abstract of the Twelfth Census (1900). Two innovations occurred in the 1902 Abstract in the form of two summary tables-one for the United States, the other for foreign countries. The first entitled "Progress of the United States in Its Material Industries” was in effect an historical digest of the Abstract. It presented a cross section of data items shown elsewhere in the same edition, many in condensed form as percents and per capitas, but covered longer historical periods (decennial years 1800 to 1850 and thereafter single years to 1902). This table was included, with information updated, in subsequent editions until 1923. Although there is no direct evidence linking the two, this table foreshadows in miniature the later Statistical Abstract Supplement series of "Historical Statistics of the United States." The second table, continued annually until 1926, comprised 2 pages showing a selection of various data for "principal countries of the world." It waxed in importance to become a 'Daniel J. Boorstin, University of Chicago, 1967. (Presently Dr. Boorstin is Librarian of Congress.) J.A. Livingston, Syndicated Columnist, Philadelphia Bulletin, 1967. separate section entitled "Commercial, Financial, and Other Statistics of the Principal Countries of the World," until in 1920, it comprised 15 tables and 48 pages. Here again, although linkage of an earlier development with a later may rest largely on conceptual coincidence, this section on "principal countries" may have inspired the current Abstract section on "Comparative International Statistics." The tendency toward emphasis on inclusion of foreign trade data in the Statistical Abstract, although diminished, lasted well into the present century. By 1920, the foreign trade tables occupied less than a fourth of the book and both the arrangement and variety of subjects covered had greatly advanced toward the basic pattern followed today. During the 1920's and 1930's, a rough stability appears to have been achieved within the various Abstract editions in 2 respects: 1) The size of the volume reached and remained approximately 900 pages; 2) a balance was struck in space allocation of 15 to 16 percent for social measures (crudely defined as population, vital statistics, immigration, and education) and the remainder for other measures. Among the broad subject categories of the latter, foreign commerce claimed 15 to 18 percent, agriculture became a more important space contender with 12 to 14 percent; industrial data (comprising manufactures, mining, and power) rose from 10 to 15 percent; and a combination of communications and transportation averaged 10 percent; finally, financial data (comprising public finance and money and banking) remained high-ranked with a 16 to 19 percent space share. Newly introduced into the Abstract, as well as relatively newly available from their original sources, during the latter years of the 1930's were data on national income accounts, on family income distribution and family expenditures, and on public welfare (old-age insurance, unemployment compensation, and public assistance-tables which subsequently became part of a separate "Social Security" section in the 1939 Abstract). Throughout the period, some of the subjects omitted entirely or relegated to minor importance in terms of space were unemployment, crime, life expectancy, nutrition, physical health (as against mental health), hospitals, physicians, recreation, elections, national defense, labor productivity, union membership, income distribution, households and housing (until 1939), business mergers, and newspapers. Data for these were either nonexistent, were overlooked if they did exist, or lacking pressing constituencies considered unimportant. By 1941, the Abstract exceeded 1,000 pages. The gradual increase in size of each edition was for the most part a reflection of the growth in number and length of the tables. Two nonstatistical parts of the book, however, kept pace with the increase in the amount of statistical data shown: the detailed listing of table titles in the table of contents and the subject index. These two took up 61 pages in the 1941 Abstract and a newly introduced 15-page "Bibliography of Sources of Statistical Data" brought the total of nontabular material to 76 pages. In subsequent editions, the subject index and the bibliography (later retitled "Guide to Sources of Statistics") continued to expand in detail and size. Beginning with the 1943 Abstract, however, the table of contents was reduced to a total of 4 pages. Another type of textual information which developed markedly in the 1944-1945 Abstract was the "general note" included at the beginning of each section. The earliest form of this "note" appears in the 1908 edition as a page of "explanatory notes" relating wholly to imports and exports. The practice of including a "general note" at the beginning of a section gradually spread. Until the 1944-1945 edition, however, the notes were quite brief (never more than half a page), sometimes elaborating on what was previously part of a particular table or set of tables or referring to the method of collecting the data, the terminology used in the tables, or the limitations of the data. In the 1944-1945 edition, such notes appeared in 22 of the 34 sections, some for the first time, many in expanded form, almost all in a broadened perspective which applied to the entire section rather than, as had been true earlier, stressing a particular aspect of the data in a section. In the 1947 edition, the designation "general note," as applied previously, was no longer shown; the introductory text, however, remained and by 1952, every section began with a statement containing, some more, some less, such standard elements as a brief tracing of the origins and references to sources of the data shown, other sources which might be consulted, definitions of terms, caveats regarding uses of the data, etc. The introductory text for each section, the bibliography of sources, and the specific source citations below each table both supported shown and served independently 100 Editions of the Statistical Abstract vii as reference aids for needs beyond the immediate data. A number of surveys of users beginning with a postcard survey in 19431 have unsurprisingly identified libraries and librarians as the largest bloc of users of the Abstract. A prime motive of the policy to expand the amount and types of nontabular material was to make the book more helpful as a referral resource for librarians. During the 1940's and 1950's, the content of the Abstract continued the trend toward a more comprehensive and more varied mirroring of public interest and concerns. Measured against previous editions, it was a mixture of more social and socio-economic statistics with business and industry data about the same; foreign commerce and financial data made way partly for other subjects receiving fuller treatment and partly for new subjects such as international statistics. By 1959, nearly one fourth of all statistics fell within such sections as population, vital statistics (including health care and nutrition), education, law enforcement (including Federal courts), social insurance and welfare services, and an expanded subsection on family and individual income. Collaterally, the primarily dollar-oriented data of earlier editions represented largely by the sections on foreign commerce, national government finances, banking and finance, and distribution and services had receded to less than a fifth. At the same time, business and industry statistics, literally the sections on manufactures, business enterprise, mining and mineral products, power, and construction and housing, much of which could as easily be included with the group immediately above, maintained a level of about one-seventh. Data on agriculture which amounted to 15 percent in the 1944-1945 edition fell to less than 10 percent. Even the sections on transportation and communication were less impressive as space occupants managing an average 8 percent during the 20 years ending in 1959 as against a 10-percent average in the previous two decades. All of the above amounted to about 80 percent of statistical content. The remainder was the result of a buildup of subjects which were present but not nearly as fully in earlier Abstract editions and of the entry of new subjects. The buildup was especially true for such sections as labor force, military services, national income, elections, and construction and housing. Among the infusion of new subjects were data equivalent to subsections on recreation, geography, scientific development, advertising, and foreign aid and a completely new section entitled "Comparative International Statistics" (introduced in 1952). An important factor to keep in mind in considering the changes in spatial allocations to the broad subject categories is the relative stability in size of the Abstract. With one exception, the 1949 edition, no edition since 1945 has exceeded 1100 pages, with more than half of the editions covering the span from 1944-1945 to 1979 falling within the range of 1,046 to 1,061 pages. Since 1945, furthermore, the amount of strictly tabular pages (those showing statistics) has declined from 90 percent to 77 percent of total pages. Given the stability of the size of the Abstract volumes and the reduction of statistical content in proportion to the whole, changes in the types of statistics selected for inclusion appear to have been made with deliberation and attention to the subject matter balance of the book and a continuing concern about the portrait of the times which it might, taken as a whole, present to its users. Over the decades, particularly since 1940, when the social and socio-economic data content of the Abstract was catching up with and overtaking the concentration on financial and foreign commerce data, the process of reducing the latter was also accompanied by many infusions of new data and rearrangements of data still included. The Business Enterprise section introduced in the 1950 edition for which most of the data were transferred from other sections of the Abstract is a good example of such rearrangement. An example of new data is the flow-of-funds data added to the Banking, Finance, and Insurance section. Other examples of new business and industry data introduced since 1950 include: manufacturing capacity rates; capital in manufacturing industries; export-related employment in manufacturing; concentration among large manufacturing companies; U.S. investment abroad in mining and petroleum; injuries and fatalities in mineral industries; price, wage scale, and cost indexes in construction; residential capital; gross housing product; housing inventory; capital expenditures in retail trade; franchising; and advertising *The postcard was bound into the 1942 edition. |