Benefits August 11, 2008

Government Workers Have Greater Access to Benefits

August 11, 2008 (PLANSPONSOR.com) - New government data shows that two-thirds of private industry and government workers had access to retirement benefits in March 2008.
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A news release from the Department of Labor’s Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) said nearly three-quarters of civilian workers also had access to medical care in March.

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According to the release, access to and participation in retirement and medical care benefits were greater in government employment than in private industry.

Major BLS findings include:

  • Sixty-one percent of private industry employees had access to paid retirement benefits, compared with 89% of state and local government employees. Eighty-six percent of government employees participated in a retirement plan, significantly greater than the approximately half of private industry workers.
  • Medical care benefits were available to 71% of private industry workers, compared to 87% among government workers. About half of private industry workers participated in a plan, less than the nearly three-quarters of government workers who did so.
  • Virtually all full-time employees in state and local government had access to retirement and medical benefits: 99% and 98%, respectively. In private industry, only 71% of full-time workers had access to retirement benefits and 85% to medical care.
  • Employers paid 83% of the cost of premiums for single coverage and 71% of the cost for family coverage for workers participating in employer-sponsored medical plans. Employer share for single coverage was greater in state and local government (90%) than in private industry (81%). For family coverage, the employer share of premiums was similar for private industry and government, 71% and 73%, respectively.
  • Service occupations in private industry had significantly lower rates of access to major benefits than workers in management, professional, and related occupations, where the differences between these two groups in state and local government were not as large.
  • Access to paid holidays and paid vacations was greater in private industry, due in part to the fact that many teachers and other employees in educational services who are employed on the basis of nine-month contracts do not receive formal paid holidays or vacation benefits.

The data is from the National Compensation Survey (NCS), which provides measures of occupational earnings, compensation cost trends, and incidence and provisions of employee benefit plans.

More information is available here .

Compliance August 8, 2008

Appellate Court Revives Boeing Sex Harassment Suit

August 8, 2008 (PLANSPONSOR.com) - A federal appellate court has breathed new life into a sexual harassment and retaliation lawsuit filed against the Boeing Company on behalf of a female helicopter mechanic.
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An Arizona Republic news report said the 9 th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals threw out a ruling by a federal judge in Arizona that the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC), which filed the suit on behalf of Kelley Miles, had not proven its case.The suit alleged Miles was sexually harassed and was later retaliated against while working at Boeing’s Mesa, Arizona,   Apache helicopterplant (See EEOC Claims Harassment At Boeing ).

Unlike U.S. District Judge   Paul Rosenblatt who dismissed the suit, the appellate panel found that there was enough evidence to allow a jury to find Miles was harassed and retaliated against.   The 9 th Circuit sent the case back to the lower court for additional hearings.

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Appellate judges said there were also remaining questions of fact about whether the company took adequate steps to deal with the reported harassment and whether it retaliated against Miles for reporting the problem.

According to the suit, Miles had been the subject of repeated sexual harassment by male co-workers who stole her tools and shook a helicopter while she was inside in addition to using offensive and sexual language and making physical advances.

An EEOC announcement about the appellate ruling said the 9 th Circuit judges found that   although Boeing terminated one offending male employee and disciplined another, “a reasonable jury could find that these two employees were part of a much larger problem with respect to Miles’ treatment.”

According to the court, there was evidence that the employee who was eventually terminated had been transferred into Miles’s department because he had repeatedly harassed other female employees. The court added that evidence also existed showing that the harassment continued even after Boeing took its initial measures, and the company knew or should have known that the problems were continuing.

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