Employer Costs for Employee Compensation News Release — 2008-09-10

Employers spent an average of $1.25 for employee retirement and savings plans for every hour worked in June 2008, the U.S. Department of Labor�s Bureau of Labor Statistics reported today. This accounted for 4.4 percent of total compensation. Retirement and savings, which includes both defined benefit and defined contribution plans, is only one of several benefits included in the Employer Costs for Employee Compensation survey, along with wages and salaries. Total compensation (wages and salaries and benefits) for civilian workers averaged $28.48 per hour worked in June 2008. Wages and salaries, which averaged $19.85, accounted for 69.7 percent of these costs, while benefits, which averaged $8.64, accounted for the remaining 30.3 percent. (See table 1.) The Employer Costs for Employee Compensation program, a product of the National Compensation Survey, measures employer costs for wages, salaries, and employee benefits for nonfarm private and state and local government workers.