A method and system for analyzing and optimizing the distribution of work from a plurality of queues includes storing historical data in a database. The historical data may include sets of different types of data items, each of the data items having an associated monetary value. The method further includes assigning a relative score to each of the data items within the sets and calculating a cumulative monetary value for each relative score, the cumulative monetary value being the summation of the monetary values for all items having relative scores up to and including the relative score. The method further includes determining the maximum cumulative monetary value calculated and its corresponding relative score. In one embodiment, the corresponding relative score is then used to determine which items to work in a set of queues that has not yet been worked.