Compensation costs per hour, March 2009

Employer costs for employee compensation averaged $29.39 per hour worked in March 2009 for civilian workers.

[Chart data—TXT]

Wages and salaries, which averaged $20.49, accounted for 69.7 percent of these costs, while benefits, which averaged $8.90, accounted for the remaining 30.3 percent.

Costs for legally required benefits, including Social Security, Medicare, unemployment insurance, and workers’ compensation, averaged $2.28 per hour (7.8 percent of total compensation). Employer costs for life, health, and disability insurance benefits averaged $2.52 (8.6 percent); paid leave benefits (vacations, holidays, sick leave, and personal leave) averaged $2.08 (7.1 percent); and retirement and savings benefits averaged $1.31 (4.5 percent) per hour worked.

This information is from the BLS Employment Cost Trends program. These data are for civilian workers (defined here as nonfarm private industry and State and local government workers.) To learn more, see "Employer Costs for Employee Compensation—March 2009" (PDF) (HTML), news release USDL 09-0634.