Cost of Living Index Data

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Description

This dataset shows cost of living index for the current year. Data is available at the nation, state, MSA, and county levels. Emsi's cost of living data is based on the Cost of Living Index published by the Council for Community and Economic Research (C2ER).

When requesting an MSA code as the area constraint in a query, the code must be prepended by MSA (e.g. for MSA code 10540, use 'MSA10540').

Use Cases

Questions answered by this dataset:

  • What county has the lowest cost of living index?
  • How does the cost of living in the Bronx compare to New York state?

Metrics

  • COLI: Cost of Living Index

Filters

  • Area (Nation, State, MSA, County)
  • Year

Core LMI Metadata

This dataset is offered via the Core LMI API. The metadata for this Core LMI API dataset is below.

AttributeDescription
Dataset IDEMSI.us.CostOfLivingIndex
Dataset URLhttps://agnitio.emsicloud.com/meta/dataset/EMSI.us.CostOfLivingIndex/{version}
Area Aggregation Path

The area aggregation path refers to the hierarchy that shows how data is aggregated, starting from the lowest-level geography and progressing to the highest-level geography.

The levels in the aggregation path include:

Aggregation Path

1234

Level

1NationMetropolitan USNationMetropolitan US
2StateMSAStateMSA
3CountyCountyCountyCounty
4Zip CodeZip CodeCensus TractCensus Tract

Datasets with lower granularity aggregates only up to Level 1

Versions

http://agnitio.emsicloud.com/meta/dataset/EMSI.us.CostOfLivingIndex/2025.4

Metrics

[
{
  "name": "COLI"
}
]

Dimensions

[
{
  "name": "Area",
  "levelsStored": [
     "1",
     "2",
     "3"
  ]
}
]

Attributes

{
"minYearInclusive": "2025",
"name": "CostOfLivingIndex",
"type": "dataset",
"path": "CostOfLivingIndex",
"maxYearInclusive": "2025",
"description": "# Description\n\nThis dataset shows cost of living index for the current year. Data is available at the nation, state, MSA, and county levels. Emsi's cost of living data is based on the Cost of Living Index published by the Council for Community and Economic Research (C2ER).\n\nWhen requesting an MSA code as the area constraint in a query, the code must be prepended by MSA (e.g. for MSA code 10540, use 'MSA10540').\n\n# Use Cases\n\n#### Questions answered by this dataset:\n\n* What county has the lowest cost of living index?\n* How does the cost of living in the Bronx compare to New York state?\n\n# Metrics\n\n* COLI: Cost of Living Index\n\n# Filters\n\n* Area (Nation, State, MSA, County)\n* Year\n",
"countryCode": "us",
"displayName": "US Cost of Living Index",
"currentYear": "2025",
"releaseDate": "2025-09-11 21:00:35.1482515Z",
"datarun": "2025.4",
"levelsStored_AreaID": "[1:[1,2,3],2:[1,2,3]]",
"numAggPaths_AreaID": "2"
}