Summary

Description

The Employment Cost Index (ECI) is a quarterly measure of the change in the cost of labor, free from the influence of employment shifts among occupations and industries. The compensation series includes changes in wages and salaries plus employer costs for employee benefits. The wage and salary series and benefit series provide the change for the two components of compensation. Employee benefit costs are calculated as cost-per-hour-worked for 21 benefits, ranging from employer payments for Social Security to paid time off for holidays. The survey covers all occupations in the civilian economy, which includes the total private economy (excluding farms and households), and the public sector (excluding the Federal government). Estimates are published for the private and public sectors separately, and are combined in a measure of change for the civilian economy.