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Census Business Patterns - Industry & Employment Data by Location

Extract U.S. Census County Business Patterns (CBP) data: employee counts, establishment counts, and annual payroll — segmented by NAICS industry code and geographic level (national, state, county, or ZIP code).

Data is sourced directly from the U.S. Census Bureau CBP API. A free Census API key is now required for live data; default runs return a clear requires_census_api_key setup item instead of failing.

What This Actor Does

• Queries the Census 2021 CBP dataset via the official REST API
• Filters by any NAICS 2017 industry code (2-digit sector down to 6-digit subsector)
• Returns results at national, state, county, or ZIP code geographic level
• Outputs structured records ready for analysis, market research, or lead generation

Use Cases

• Market sizing — How many restaurants (NAICS 72) are in each U.S. state?
• Business density analysis — Which ZIP codes have the highest concentration of healthcare establishments?
• Competitive research — How large is the labor market for a given industry in a target county?
• Economic intelligence — Compare payroll and employment trends across geographies
• Lead generation — Identify high-density industry clusters for outreach campaigns

Input

Common NAICS Codes

Common State FIPS Codes

Output

Each record contains:

Example Output

[
{
"naicsCode":"72",
"naicsLabel":"Accommodation and food services",
"employees":"1812928",
"establishments":"91942",
"annualPayroll":"37029834",
"firstQuarterPayroll":"8543210",
"stateFips":"06",
"countyFips":"",
"zipCode":""
}
]

If apiKey is omitted, the actor returns a setup item instead of failing:

[
{
"status":"requires_census_api_key",
"message":"The Census Data API currently redirects unauthenticated requests to a missing-key page. Provide apiKey from api.census.gov/data/key_signup.html to retrieve live County Business Patterns data."
}
]

Data Source

U.S. Census Bureau — County Business Patterns (2021)

• Coverage: All U.S. states and territories
• Frequency: Annual (2021 is the most recent CBP release available via this API)
• Official documentation: https://www.census.gov/data/developers/data-sets/cbp-nonemp-zbp/cbp-api.html

Notes

• Suppressed cells (where data is withheld for confidentiality) appear as "0" or "N" in the Census response — this is normal Census disclosure avoidance behavior, not an actor error.
• ZIP code queries can return large result sets. Use stateCode to limit scope, or set maxResults accordingly.
• NAICS codes must match the 2017 revision. Prior-year codes may differ at the subsector level.