May 03, 2004 (The Editor’s Desk is updated each business day.)

State and local government compensation costs up 3.3 percent in past 12 months

The rate of increase in compensation costs slowed to 3.3 percent for State and local governments for the year ended March 2004, compared with an over-the-year gain of 4.2 percent in March 2003.

12-month percent changes in Employment Cost Index, State and local government, not seasonally adjusted, March 1999 - March 2004
[Chart data—TXT]

The components of compensation—wages and salaries, and benefit costs—continued to show significant differences. For State and local government workers, wages and salaries rose 2.1 percent in the year ended March 2004, compared with an increase of 6.2 percent for benefits.

These data are from the BLS Compensation Cost Trends program. Over-the-year percent changes are calculated using not-seasonally-adjusted data. For more information, see "Employment Cost Index – March 2004" (PDF) (TXT), news release USDL 04-751.

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