March 13, 2009 (The Editor’s Desk is updated each business day.)

Employer costs and paid leave, December 2008

Employer costs for paid leave benefits were highest for management, professional, and related occupations, $4.09 per hour, or 8.4 percent of total compensation, in December 2008.

Employer costs per hour worked for paid leave, private industry workers, by major occupational group, December 2008
[Chart data—TXT]

Costs were lowest among service occupations, 57 cents or 4.3 percent of total compensation.

Among all workers, paid leave benefits averaged $1.85, or 6.8 percent of the total.

Paid leave benefit costs are often directly linked to wages; therefore, higher paid occupations or industries will typically show higher estimates for this compensation component. Paid leave includes vacations, holidays, sick leave, and other leave such as personal leave, military leave, and funeral leave.

These data are from the National Compensation Survey’s Compensation Cost Trends program. To learn more about employer costs for employee wages, salaries and benefits, see "Employer Costs for Employee Compensation - December 2008," (PDF) (HTML) news release USDL 09-0247.