The number of U.S. employees using the Internet to enroll for benefits is rapidly increasing and changing the enrollment process. This past enrollment season, Hewitt Associates, a global outsourcing and consulting firm, found that the percentage of employees enrolling online has nearly doubled - in only two years.
Stock option overhang levels increased significantly in 2000, even though a majority of employers lowered their overhang in an attempt to find an optimal level that benefits both shareholders and employees.
Paid time off was the most prevalent benefit available to workers in private establishments in 1999, with paid vacations offered to 79 percent of employees and paid holidays to 75 percent, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, U.S. Department of Labor.
Chicago Tribune columnist Carol Kleiman writes that she hears complaints from single people who feel left out of their companies' family-friendly benefit programs and put upon by colleagues who go absent because of child-rearing obligations.
Keeping the 'Fun' BenefitEven as recession sends the pendulum back toward the traditional workplace, many companies are trying to hold onto their foosball tables, casual-dress codes, and other New Economy trappings, according to the Christian Science Monitor.
As share prices have fallen over the past year and a half, it has become clear that not all employer stock handouts are created equal, according to the Wall Street Journal Online.
Broad retreats from generous salaries and benefits, once largely confined to the high-tech industry, are now appearing in other hard-hit sectors, including auto makers, airlines, media, hotels and certain financial services, the Wall Street Journal Online reports.
Small business owners take human resources counsel seriously when making employee benefit decisions, even though they don't always agree on what's important, a study finds.
