Are Salary Surveys Accurate

Both the Techwr-l list (link to start of thread) and the STC Member Forum (link to thread) have a very interesting discussion going on about the value and accuracy of salary surveys. It appears that the STC has come to the conclusion that their surveys, where data was gathered anonymously, have been innacurate. Other surveys, like the Radford (www.radford.com) and US Bureau of Labor Statistics (www.bls.gov) survey are also discussed.

Here in Israel there are a number organizations that conduct salary surveys, including Jacob Richman's annual CJI  survey of hi-tech professional salaries(www.cji.co.il/docs.htm), Zviran (www.zviran.co.il), Atzmon (www.atsmon.co.il) and elephant.org.il (www.elephant.org.il/salarybenefits).