More Mandates? More Options? Which is Better?

What would the affect be on the workplace if we made more parts of compensation statutory ("statutory" meaning required)?

The underlying premise being that making a part of compensation statutory would be for the greater good, much the way Unemployment Insurance, Workers’ Compensation and Social Security/Medicare are today. As we struggle as a nation with healthcare reform, what if coverage for everyone was considered as a form of statutory compensation?  

There are many models and examples of statutory compensation from around the globe. Here are just a few:

Other components often include equity, retirement/pensions, life/death benefits, disability, etc.

In many cases, without statutory mandates, things such as separation payments, certain benefits and other perks end up being limited to more senior executives who have the ability and experience to negotiate such packages. Mandates would force us to spread things through our organizations. In some cases, perhaps these mandates could bring down certain costs (e.g., if more people are insured, the pool is bigger, so premiums may come down). On the other hand, any company — large or small — can only afford a certain amount for total compensation. Would these mandates force salaries down, especially for junior employees, and have a potentially adverse affect on our economy?

If more things were mandated with these types of compensation standards, would our jobs have less room for creativity, flexibility and discretion or allow us to hone our skills and shine in other ways?  

Terri Albee, CCP, is managing partner of HR Ops Team LLC, which provides scalable and affordable human resources services, ensuring human resources structures are in legal compliance, streamlined for funding or exit events, or just optimized for day-to-day operations.  Terri has planned and managed HR operations in a variety of industry verticals from start-up organizations to the Fortune 500, domestically and globally.  Her experience encompasses design, implementation, compliance and management of compensation, benefit and equity plans at all levels.

Comments

[Paul Weatherhead]

Terri,

A very thought-provoking blog! Thanks for posing the question.

Seems to me that many industries in the US have already priced themselves out of employing US workers as evidenced by the number of "Made in China" tags on products and the computer service calls made to India.

It will be interesting to see if this rising unemployment rate falls to pre-2008 levels.

So perhaps the real question is what levels of total reward reductions can be made to return jobs to the US?

Paul

[Terri Albee]

Thanks Paul. I think it's an important question for us all to consider.

I heard an interesting interview with T.R. Reid, a Washington Post reporter, talking about his new book "The Healing of America" on NPR/CPR http://kcfr.org/cgi-bin/comatters/comatters_play.asx?play=3794&type=comatters.asx He discusses how other countries have lower cost structures for health care and healthier populations than the US.

If we're going to remain competitive globally, we need to look at what our global competitors do, how their remuneration is structured and learn from them (not just on the health care front).