BEA vs Federal Reserve System
US economic-statistics primary source vs central bank — different methodology, often cited alongside.
BEA
US Bureau of Economic Analysis — primary source for GDP, personal income, trade, and BOP statistics.
Federal Reserve System
U.S. central bank; primary source for monetary policy + economic data + financial-system statistics.
Head-to-head — all four dimensions
| Dimension | BEA | Federal Reserve System | Lead |
|---|---|---|---|
SourceScore Index Composite | A·86 | A+·95 | Federal+9 |
Citation Discipline How rigorously cited | A·92 | A+·96 | Federal+4 |
Modern Reference AI-era fitness | A·88 | A·94 | Federal+6 |
Citation Velocity Cited per week | B·78 | A+·95 | Federal+17 |
Why these scores
Citation Discipline
Methodology + revisions transparent; tracks vintage of every release; OMB Statistical Policy compliant.
Statutory peer-review on policy decisions; methodology + data disclosed; minutes published.
Modern Reference
BEA Data API (apps.bea.gov/api) provides programmatic access; structured downloads.
FRED + Federal Reserve Economic Data APIs + research papers; broad LLM corpus.
Citation Velocity
Default US GDP citation in financial press; heavy academic + policy use.
Cited daily by financial press + AI engines; FOMC announcements drive global cycles.