May 10, 2000 (The Editor’s Desk is updated each business day.)
Hourly benefits $5.58 in 1999
In March 1999, employer costs for benefits for civilian workers averaged
$5.58 per hour worked. Wages
and salaries were $14.72 and accounted for 72.5 percent of compensation costs.
Benefits accounted for the remaining 27.5 percent.
[Chart data—TXT]
Legally required benefits, such as Social Security and unemployment
insurance, averaged $1.65 per hour, 8.1 percent of total compensation. Such
benefits were the largest non-wage compensation cost.
Paid leave, with an average cost of $1.34 per hour worked, was the next
largest and accounted for 6.6 percent of total compensation. Following
leave were insurance ($1.29 or 6.4 percent), retirement and savings
benefits (76 cents or 3.7 percent), and supplemental pay (51 cents or 2.5
percent).
These data are a product of the Employment Cost
Trends program. Get more information on compensation costs from Employer
Costs for Employee Compensation, 1986-99, BLS Bulletin 2526.
Of interest
Spotlight on Statistics: National Hispanic Heritage Month
In this Spotlight, we take a look at the Hispanic labor force—including labor force participation, employment and unemployment, educational attainment, geographic location, country of birth, earnings, consumer expenditures, time use, workplace injuries, and employment projections.
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Read more »