Employee Compensation: Employer Spending on Benefits Has Grown Faster Than Wages, Due Largely to Rising Costs for Health Insurance and Retirement Benefits

United States Government Publishing Office publisher pbl distributor dst United States Government Accountability Office author aut Government Organization text government publication eng GAOREPORTS Legislative Agency Publications gao legislative 2010-08-12 U.S. Government Printing Office 2006-02-24 monographic deposited born digital 61 p. GA 1.13:GAO-06-285 https://www.govinfo.gov/app/details/GAOREPORTS-GAO-06-285 P0b002ee18039707c f:d06285 DGPO 2010-08-12 2011-03-24 GAOREPORTS-GAO-06-285 machine generated eng fdlp REPORT GAOREPORTS-GAO-06-285 GAO-06-285 Compensation Cost analysis Employee benefit plans Employee medical benefits Employees Fringe benefit costs Fringe benefits Private sector Statistical data Subsidies Other Written Product A47797 Employee Compensation: Employer Spending on Benefits Has Grown Faster Than Wages, Due Largely to Rising Costs for Health Insurance and Retirement Benefits Because most workers rely primarily on their employers to provide both wages and benefits as part of a total compensation package, the trends in the costs and availability of employer-sponsored compensation have a significant bearing on workers' well-being. Through tax preferences and payroll taxes, federal government policy also has a bearing on employees' access to benefits and on the costs carried by employers. The federal government provides significant tax subsidies for both health insurance plans and qualified retirement plans. In addition, workers and employers are required to pay taxes that fund Social Security and Medicare, programs intended to help provide for workers' economic security and peace of mind in retirement. In this report, GAO examined federal data on private employers' costs for active workers and sought perspectives from 17 experts to identify (1) recent trends in employers' total compensation costs; (2) composition of the trends; (3) whether employees' costs, participation, or access to benefits changed; and (4) possible implications of the changes for private systems. GAO received technical comments from the Departments of Labor and Health and Human Services and from some of the experts GAO consulted. These comments were incorporated as appropriate. https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/GAOREPORTS-GAO-06-285/html/GAOREPORTS-GAO-06-285.htm https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/GAOREPORTS-GAO-06-285/pdf/GAOREPORTS-GAO-06-285.pdf GAO-06-285 https://www.govinfo.gov/app/details/GAOREPORTS-GAO-06-285 Other Written Product GAO-06-285; Employee Compensation: Employer Spending on Benefits Has Grown Faster Than Wages, Due Largely to Rising Costs for Health Insurance and Retirement Benefits; Compensation Cost analysis Employee benefit plans Employee medical benefits Employees Fringe benefit costs Fringe benefits Private sector Statistical data Subsidies