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Previously, our blogs have provided insights into how COLI data can help make a wide variety of decisions, such as choosing college destinations, owning pets, planning vacations, and much more. In this post, we will show you how integrating COLI’s dataset with other data enables subscribers to tell richer, more compelling stories.
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With COLI, subscribers save time from data collection, data review and compilation and can focus on developing other value-added work. This is because our data is comprised of prices for over 60 goods and services at the local level that are organized into six categories: food, housing, utilities, transportation, health care, and miscellaneous items. It has been published quarterly by the Council for Economic Research (C2ER) since 1968. Notably, COLI is recognized by the U.S. Census Bureau and the Bureau of Labor Statistics, providing its users with access to reliable data to make informed decisions. It is also the only dataset that has consistently been updated since 1968, giving subscribers unprecedented access to historical and current cost of living data.
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Organizations, whether large or small, leverage COLI data in various ways. CNN Money, PayScale, Geographic Solutions, Chmura and Lightcast, are just some of the organizations that license COLI data. In addition to embedding the COLI calculator onto their websites, many clients also integrate COLI data with their own data to enhance comparisons between two or more geographies. For example, some clients use COLI to help companies adjust employee salaries. Others layer education, socio-economic status, and other standard of living metrics with COLI data to offer a more holistic understanding of any given region to inform data-driven decision making.
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In our next two blog posts, C2ER will be posting how COLI can be used to make an adjustment on median household incomes, using data published by Bureau of Economic Analysis as well as occupational wage comparisons using data published by the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
Stay tuned!
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