Dive Brief:
- Labor Day — the unofficial end of summer — is around the corner, and 97% of employers will provide a paid day off for all or most employees on the holiday a week from today (9/7), according to a nationwide Bloomberg BNA survey of over 100 HR professionals.
- However, over two in five employers, or 41%, indicated that they will require some employees to work on the holiday, figures virtually identical to the company's 2013 holiday practices survey.
- Technical and security/public safety personnel are most likely, with 15% of all responding organizations saying they will have security or public safety personnel and technical workers report to work on September 7. Also, 13% of organizations will have professional employees at work on Labor Day, 11% will ensure managers or supervisors are working on the holiday, and 10% percent will have service/maintenance staff and sales and customer service personnel on the clock.
Dive Insight:
The good news is those required to work wil get a little extra in their paychecks, as the vast majority of organizations — 86% — that have at least some employees work on Labor Day will provide something more than regular pay for their holiday labor, including time-and-a-half pay (27%), both extra pay and compensatory time (18%), double-time pay (16%), and "other" forms of extra pay such as "double-time-and-a-half" (16%) or comp time in addition to regular pay (9%).
When it comes to size, 86% of large organizations (1,000 or more employees) will require at least some employees to work on Labor Day, compared to only 29% of smaller organizations. 56% of non-business organizations — such as hospitals, government agencies and municipalities —will require at least some employees to be on staff on Labor Day as compared to only 35% of non-manufacturers and 30% of manufacturers.
In the end, Labor Day will in fact be a day of labor for some Americans, but at least most of them will get a financial benefit from being on the clock.
