February 02, 2009
(The Editor’s Desk is updated each business day.)
Compensation costs in private industry up 2.4 percent in 2008
In private industry, compensation costs rose 2.4 percent in the year ended December 2008, less than the increase for the year ended December 2007, which was 3.0 percent.
[Chart data—TXT]
Private industry wages and salaries increased 2.6 percent in December 2008. In December 2007, the increase was 3.3 percent.
In private industry, benefit costs increased 2.0 percent. For the year ended December 2007, the increase in benefit costs was 2.4 percent.
These data are from the BLS Employment Cost Trends program. Compensation costs (also known as employment costs) include wages, salaries, and employer costs for employee benefits. For more information, see "Employment Cost Index—December 2008" (PDF) (HTML), news release USDL 09-0096.
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