February 01, 2008 (The Editor’s Desk is updated each business day.)

Compensation costs in private industry up 3.0 percent in 2007

In private industry, compensation costs rose 3.0 percent in the year ended December 2007. In December 2006 the increase was 3.2 percent.

12-month percent changes in Employment Cost Index, private industry, December 2002-December 2007
[Chart data—TXT]

Wages and salaries for private industry workers increased 3.3 percent for the 12-month period ended December 2007. Benefit costs increased 2.4 percent.

These data are from the BLS Compensation Cost Trends program. Compensation costs (also known as employment costs) include wages, salaries, and employer costs for employee benefits. For more information, see "Employment Cost Index – December 2007" (PDF) (HTML), news release USDL 08-0129.