Patent ID: 6862596

Claim:
A method in a computer system for exchanging economic data with a user, comprising: receiving a request from a user for a first item of economic data, the first item including at least one of wage data, cost of living data, cost of labor data, and employee benefit data based on a first sample size; retrieving the first item of economic data from a database; providing over the Internet a web page for view by the user, the web page displaying the first item of economic data and an indication of the first sample size; receiving a second item of economic data from the user over the Internet in exchange for the first item of economic data, the second item of economic data including at least one of wage data, cost of living data, cost of labor data and employee benefit data; checking the second item of economic data for validity or acceptability by determining whether the second item of economic data is consistent with economic data in the database of the same type as the second item of data; and updating the database to include the second item of data if the second item of data is determined to be valid or acceptable; and updating the first sample size to be a second sample size greater than the first sample size.