Recently, I decided it makes sense to track economic indicators, their respective effects on various industries, and their trends. Such information would be valuable in making assessments of return and risk on stocks. (I use inflationdata.com for historical inflation rates.) I found that the US Department of Commerce has a Bureau of Economic Analysis that runs a nice site for data on such indicators. Similarly, the US Department of Energy has an Energy Information Administration that runs a site for data. The non-profit Conference Board publishes consumer confidence data at its web site.