Employers Spent $25.86 an Hour For Employee Comp in June

According to a BLS news release, wages and salaries, at $18.21 per hour, made up 70.4% of the costs for employee compensation. The cost of benefits made up the rest.

The cost for life, health, and disability insurance was $2.05 an hour or 7.9% of total benefits costs, according to the release. The cost for paid leave benefits averaged $1.70 (or 6.6% of total), and the cost for retirement and savings benefits averaged $1.09 (or 4.2% of total).

The cost for legally required benefits, including social security, Medicare, unemployment insurance, and workers compensation averaged $2.12 an hour or 8.2% of total compensation.

Specifically, according to the release, the costs for compensation and benefits for private industry employers were:

• $24.24 for total compensation costs,
• $17.21 for wages and salaries (71%),
• $7.03 for benefits (29%),
• $1.54 for paid leave (6.3%),
• 69 cents for supplemental benefits (2.9%),
• $1.76 for insurance benefits (7.3%),
• 88 cents for retirement and savings benefits (3.6%), and
• $2.12 for legally required benefits (8.7%).

The BLS detailed how retirement and savings costs varied by industry, occupation, bargaining status, region, and company size. Specifically, the differences listed in the news release, include:

• $1.59 in goods-producing industries vs. 79 cents in service-providing industries,
• 18 cents per hour for service occupations vs. $1.75 for management, professional and other such occupations,
• 55 cents for sales and office occupations, 86 cents for production, transportation, and material moving occupations, and $1.35 for natural resources, construction and maintenance workers,
• $2.37 for union workers vs. 71 cents for non-union workers, defined benefit plan costs were especially higher for union workers than non-union ($1.84 vs. 28 cents), and
• $1.00 in the Northeast, 97 cents in the West, 96 cents in the Midwest, and 71 cents in the South.

The complete BLS news release is here .