were collected, what pay forms are included, and so on. Most are based on information volunteered by site users. Some popular Web sites even misuse the cost-of-living index when making geographic salary comparisons. On the other hand, Salary.com includes a compensation glossary, identifies where the site's information comes from, and explains what the statistics mean. Put in programmer for Birmingham, Alabama, and you will be asked to choose from 37 job descriptions. Exhibit 8.5 shows the Salary.com result for just three of those programmer jobs, both at the national level and in Birmingham. By comparison, all programmer positions are included in a single category in the BLS survey, making it all but impossible to get a good match.