Employer costs for employee compensation averaged $36.63 per hour worked in September 2018

Employer costs for employee compensation averaged $36.63 per hour worked in September 2018. Wages and salaries averaged $25.03 per hour worked and accounted for 68.3 percent of these costs. Benefit costs averaged $11.60 and accounted for the remaining 31.7 percent. Employer compensation costs for private industry workers average $34.53 per hour worked, compared with an average of $50.03 for state and local government workers.

In September 2018, private industry employer costs for paid leave benefits averaged $2.41 per hour worked or 7.0 percent of total compensation, supplemental pay averaged $1.32 or 3.8 percent, insurance benefits averaged $2.74 or 7.9 percent, retirement and savings costs averaged $1.35 or 3.9 percent, and legally required benefits averaged $2.66 per hour worked or 7.7 percent.

For state and local government workers in September 2018, employers spent $5.82 per hour worked, or 11.6 percent of total compensation for retirement and savings benefits. Insurance benefit costs averaged $5.93 per hour, or 11.9 percent of total compensation. The average cost for paid leave was $3.76 per hour worked, or 7.5 percent of total compensation.

These data are from the Employment Cost Trends program. To learn more, see "Employer Costs for Employee Compensation — September 2018." Also see charts of the latest Employer Costs for Employee Compensation data.