Why Are Real Hourly Workers Comp Costs Higher For State/Local Government?
The Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) should always be a “go-to” place for any type of labor statistics. The chart I am using today for comparison is on this BLS webpage. I wanted to find out the average real hourly workers comp costs. They had it and the data is only three months old. That is not bad as most workers comp data is 18 months old in its freshest form. See this article for why that is true.
You can even request navigators to help find any labor stats that you need for a presentation or article, or to find anything in their massive databases. I had to dig a little for this one. The real hourly workers comp costs line that I took from the huge BLS table (included) below revealed a few surprises.
One Noticeable Figure
The first column n each category is the cost and the second is % of total benefits. One can see the cost for civilian workers and private industry columns are almost the same. The state and local government almost seems to be an anomaly. If one looks at the state and local government workers, the workers comp costs per hour are much more than the civilian and private industry groups.
Hold on, though, the % of total benefits is lower 1- 1.0% – than the civilian and private industry figures. The state and local government benefits are somewhat higher than the other two types of employees. Still, that looks comparatively very high.
| Workers’ compensation | 0.47 | 1.1 | 0.45 | 1.1 | 0.59 | 1.0 |
Table 1. Employer Costs for Employee Compensation by Ownership
[Mar. 2023]
| Civilian workers(1) | Private industry workers | State /Local government workers | ||||
| Cost ($) | Percent of compensation | Cost ($) | Percent of compensation | Cost ($) | |
| Total compensation(2) | 43.07 | 100.0 | 40.79 | 100.0 | 58.08 | 100.0 |
| Wages and salaries | 29.70 | 69.0 | 28.76 | 70.5 | 35.89 | 61.8 |
| Total benefits | 13.36 | 31.0 | 12.02 | 29.5 | 22.19 | 38.2 |
| Paid leave | 3.20 | 7.4 | 3.04 | 7.5 | 4.23 | 7.3 |
| Vacation | 1.56 | 3.6 | 1.55 | 3.8 | 1.57 | 2.7 |
| Holiday | 0.94 | 2.2 | 0.90 | 2.2 | 1.22 | 2.1 |
| Sick | 0.50 | 1.2 | 0.41 | 1.0 | 1.10 | 1.9 |
| Personal | 0.19 | 0.5 | 0.17 | 0.4 | 0.34 | 0.6 |
| Supplemental pay | 1.39 | 3.2 | 1.52 | 3.7 | 0.57 | 1.0 |
| Overtime and premium(3) | 0.38 | 0.9 | 0.40 | 1.0 | 0.25 | 0.4 |
| Shift differentials | 0.07 | 0.2 | 0.07 | 0.2 | 0.05 | 0.1 |
| Nonproduction bonuses | 0.95 | 2.2 | 1.05 | 2.6 | 0.27 | 0.5 |
| Insurance | 3.48 | 8.1 | 3.01 | 7.4 | 6.58 | 11.3 |
| Life | 0.05 | 0.1 | 0.05 | 0.1 | 0.08 | 0.1 |
| Health | 3.30 | 7.7 | 2.83 | 6.9 | 6.41 | 11.0 |
| Short-term disability | 0.08 | 0.2 | 0.09 | 0.2 | 0.03 | 0.1 |
| Long-term disability | 0.05 | 0.1 | 0.05 | 0.1 | 0.05 | 0.1 |
| Retirement and savings | 2.22 | 5.2 | 1.39 | 3.4 | 7.69 | 13.2 |
| Defined benefit | 1.32 | 3.1 | 0.42 | 1.0 | 7.18 | 12.4 |
| Defined contribution | 0.91 | 2.1 | 0.97 | 2.4 | 0.51 | 0.9 |
| Legally Required benefits | 3.07 | 7.1 | 3.06 | 7.5 | 3.13 | 5.4 |
| Social Security and Medicare | 2.44 | 5.7 | 2.44 | 6.0 | 2.47 | 4.3 |
| Social Security(4) | 1.95 | 4.5 | 1.96 | 4.8 | 1.88 | 3.2 |
| Medicare | 0.49 | 1.1 | 0.48 | 1.2 | 0.59 | 1.0 |
| Federal unemployment insurance | 0.02 | 0.1 | 0.03 | 0.1 | (5) – | (6) – |
| State unemployment insurance | 0.13 | 0.3 | 0.14 | 0.3 | 0.07 | 0.1 |
| Workers’ compensation | 0.47 | 1.1 | 0.45 | 1.1 | 0.59 | 1.0 |
Footnotes to Table(1) Includes workers in the private nonfarm economy except those in private households, and workers in the public sector, except the federal government.(2) Includes costs for wages and salaries and benefits.(3) Includes premium pay for work (such as overtime, weekends, and holidays) in addition to the regular work schedule.(4) Social Security refers to the Old Age, Survivors, and Disability Insurance (OASDI) program.(5) Cost per hour worked is $0.01 or less.(6) Less than .05 percent
