Category: Benefits and Compensation

This topic provides guidance on how to handle compensation issues in a way that attracts and retains the best talent and advances the strategic goals of your business. You get news and tips on what’s going on nationally and in the states, and updates on changes in regulations, possible governmental action, and emerging compensation trends.

Gauge Your Midyear Progress with These 5 Questions

Believe it or not, as I write this, the first half of 2015 has come to an end. That’s right, the year is half over, and it’s a good time to mark your progress. Are you well on your way to achieving the goals—both personal and professional—you set for yourself this year?

Divorcing Employee? Former Spouse May Elect to Continue Group Coverage

Yesterday, attorney Kathryn Grigg of Axley Brynelson, LLP, explained employers’ obligations to offer health insurance continuation and conversion benefits to an employee’s former spouse and dependents following a divorce. Today, she’ll discuss how the election to continue coverage works—and the circumstances under which that coverage may be terminated early.

Supreme Court Will Rule on Preemption of Vermont Health Reporting Law

The U.S. Supreme Court will decide whether ERISA preemption shields a self-funded health plan from state requirements to report health claims data. The court agreed June 29 to hear Gobeille v. Liberty Mutual Ins. Co. (2015 WL 2473478). The state of Vermont is appealing the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals’ ruling in Liberty Mutual v. […]

Benefits: Does Divorcing a Spouse Mean Divorcing Your Company?

Trying to find market data for some jobs may seem a little like searching for a needle in a haystack—tedious, time-consuming, and marginally successful. Often, the problem isn’t that no data are available but in how we’re look for them, says BLR’s Senior Compensation Editor Sharon McKnight, CCP, SPHR.

Supreme Court Upholds Exchange Subsidies

The U.S. Supreme Court in a 6-3 vote affirmed that subsidies may go to individuals in states with exchanges established by the federal government, and the statute did not restrict subsidies to only states that themselves ran exchanges. Such a reading of the statute was not in line with the intent of the Affordable Care […]

Slotting Jobs In When There’s No Market Data for Them

Yesterday, BLR’s Senior Compensation Editor Sharon McKnight, CCP, SPHR, took us through the process of finding compensation data for those slippery jobs that are tough to classify. Today: What to do if you’ve gone through all those steps and still find yourself coming up empty.

Aging Market Data: Strategies for Success

In strategizing salary budgets, employers often have to decide whether they want to lead, lag, or lead/lag the market rate. What factors play into aging market data to suit your employment needs? And when is it time to retire your current market data?