September 11, 2009 (The Editor’s Desk is updated each business day.)

Wages and benefits by occupational group, June 2009

In June 2009, private industry employer compensation costs averaged $27.42 per hour worked. Wages and salaries averaged $19.39 per hour (70.7 percent), while benefits averaged $8.02 (29.3 percent).

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Employer costs for paid leave averaged $1.85 per hour worked (6.8 percent); supplemental pay averaged 83 cents (3.0 percent); insurance benefits averaged $2.13 (7.8 percent); retirement and savings averaged 95 cents (3.4 percent); and legally required benefits averaged $2.26 (8.3 percent) per hour worked.

Retirement and savings costs among occupational groups ranged from 21 cents per hour worked for service occupations to $1.89 for management, professional, and related occupations. Sales and office occupations averaged 60 cents; production, transportation, and material moving occupations, 84 cents; and natural resources, construction, and maintenance occupations, $1.50 per hour. The proportion of total compensation represented by retirement and savings ranged from 1.6 percent for service workers to 4.8 percent for natural resources, construction, and maintenance workers.

This information is from the BLS Employment Cost Trends program. These data are for private industry workers. To learn more, see "Employer Costs for Employee Compensation—June 2009" (HTML) (PDF), news release USDL 09-1098.