2. Summary of Findings 1. Fringe payments vary widely among the 1,020 reporting companies, ranging from less than 6% to over 60% of payroll. 2. The average payment in 1957 was 21.8% of payroll, 47.4¢ per payroll hour, or $981 per year per employee. 3. Industry payments ranged from 13.4% for hotels to 31.7% for banks, finance and trust companies. 4. Highest payments were made in the North East, followed by the East North Central, the Western, and South Eastern regions. 5. In a majority of industries fringe payments were higher than average for the larger companies, and lower than average for the smaller companies. 6. Payments for pensions were reported by 81% of the companies, with pension payments in these companies averaging 5.1% of payroll. 7. Ninety-seven per cent of the companies reported payments for employee insurance programs, with payments averaging 2.3% of payroll. 8. Payrolls of reporting companies included 93.9% for straight time, 2.8% for overtime premium pay, 0.4% for holiday premium pay, 0.5% for shift differential, 1.8% for earned incentive or production bonuses, and 0.6% for other payroll items. 9. Employee payroll deductions for fringe benefits included 2.1% for Old-Age and Survivors Insurance, 0.1% for Railroad Retirement, state cash sickness, and similar programs, 0.5% for pensions, and 1.1% for life, hospitalization, surgical and other in surance. 10. Fringe payments for 102 identical companies increased from 15.0% in 1947 to 16.9% in 1949, 18.7% in 1951, 19.6% in 1953, 21.7% in 1955, and 23.7% in 1957. 11. When a worker is hired today, or a new wage contract is agreed upon, the wage rates established no longer measure the cost of hiring labor, and the number of hours actually worked no longer measure the number of hours for which the employer must pay. TABLE 3. Distribution of Fringe Payments as Per Cent of Payroll, by Industry Groups, 1957 Manufacturing Industries Nonmanufacturing Industries 22228166 2124566542631 36.0-37.9. 4 ... ... 38.0-39.9. ... ... 40.0 and over 6 ... ... Total companies.... 1020 656 48 45 64 12 48 16 24 33 56 79 106 48 52 25 364 114 26 55 17.7 20.3 23.1 25.5 23.5 18.8 19.6 20.1 19.9 19.4 21.1 19.2 23.7 23.5 20.3 12.3 27.1 *Includes coal mining, warehousing and laundries. 2 Banks, finance & trust companies Insurance companies Miscellaneous Industries 4. Average Fringe Payments 1957 FRINGE PAYMENTS averaged 21.8% of payroll for all companies. These payments included: what less than the all-company average, while the nonmanufacturing companies paid 24.2%, as shown in Table 4. Manufacturing firms had higher fringe payments than nonmanufacturing firms for Unemployment Compensation, workmen's compensation, insurance and vacations. Nonmanufacturing firms had higher payments for Old-Age and Survivors Insurance, pensions, discounts on goods and services purchased from the company, holiday payments and sick leave. TABLE 4. Fringe Payments by Type of Payment, 1957 3. Paid rest periods, lunch periods, wash-up time, travel time, clothes-change time, get-ready time, etc... |