py-bls-api 0.1.1

A Python wrapper for the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) API

py-bls-api

A Python wrapper for the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) API, providing easy access to select surveys, metadata, data previews, series metadata, popular series IDs, and time series data.

Features

• List available BLS surveys (get_surveys)
• Fetch survey metadata (get_survey_metadata)
• Preview data structure for a survey (get_data_preview)
• Retrieve series ID metadata as a DataFrame (get_seriesid_metadata)
• Get popular series IDs for a survey (get_popular_seriesids)
• Download time series data (get_bls_data)

Installation

Install directly from PyPI:

pip install py-bls-api

Or install from GitHub (latest development version):

pip install git+https://github.com/coding-with-chris/py-bls-api.git

Quick Start

First, import the package:

from py_bls_api import (
    get_surveys,
    get_survey_metadata,
    get_data_preview,
    get_seriesid_metadata,
    get_popular_seriesids,
    get_bls_data
)

1. List all surveys

surveys = get_surveys()
print(surveys)
# e.g., {'IP': 'Industrial Production', 'CU': 'Consumer Price Index', ...}

2. Fetch survey metadata

meta = get_survey_metadata("CU")
print(meta.keys())
# e.g., ['survey_name', 'survey_abbreviation', 'series', 'data_preview']

3. Preview data for a survey

df_preview = get_data_preview("IP")
print(df_preview.head())

4. Retrieve series metadata

df_series_meta = get_seriesid_metadata("CU")
print(df_series_meta.head())

5. Get popular series IDs

# Requires a BLS API registration key
api_key = "YOUR_API_KEY_HERE"
popular_ids = get_popular_seriesids("CU", api_key)
print(popular_ids)

6. Download time series data

series_ids = ["CUUR0000SA0"]  # e.g., CPI-All Urban Consumers
start_year = 2015
end_year = 2020
api_key = "YOUR_API_KEY_HERE"

# Returns a tuple: (data_df, log_df)
data_df, log_df = get_bls_data(series_ids, start_year, end_year, api_key)
print(data_df.head())
print(log_df)

Configuration

By default, metadata files are fetched from GitHub Pages:

https://coding-with-chris.github.io/py-bls-api/metadata/

You can override base URLs by modifying the constants in metadata_utils.py (if implemented).

Requirements

• Python 3.6+
• pandas >= 1.3.0
• requests >= 2.25.0

Contributing

Not looking for contributions at this time. However, feedback and suggestions are always welcome!
Please feel free to open an issue if you find bugs or have ideas for improvements.

License

This project is released under a Non-Commercial, No-Derivatives license. See LICENSE for details.