Beginning Monday, June 17, the Bureau of Labor Statistics of the U.S. Department of Labor will begin a study in Salt Lake City and five other areas to determine how much employers are paying in wages and benefits.
Gunnar Engen, regional commissioner, said about 300 employers in the area will be asked to cooperate in the study that is part of an effort to merge existing measures of occupational pay and compensation cost and cover an expanded range of occupations.The new approach is an attempt to determine changes in employer costs for total compensation, average wages paid to specific occupations and data on the number and percent of employees offered and covered by selected benefits, with details of specific benefit plans.
Bureau economists will conduct test interviews with the employers and complete the survey during personal interviews. Data collected will be held in confidence and used for statistical purposes only, Engen said.