Lawmakers, insurers and labor experts debate raising workers' compensation indemnity from 60% to 66 2/3%

Representative Mackenzie introduced proposed changes to how workers' compensation indemnity is calculated — raising the indemnity rate from 60% of gross wages to 66 2/3% — and invited stakeholders to describe potential fiscal and administrative effects.

Nathan Bennesie, an attorney at Pretty Flaherty representing the National Council on Compensation Insurance (NCCI), said an NCCI analysis done in January estimated a near-term impact on voluntary market loss costs of “between plus 5% to plus 6.3%,” which he translated to about $12 million to $15 million in additional premium for 2025. Bennesie described how the calculation considered increases in indemnity utilization and broke the impact down by claim type: a 9.5% increase for permanent total indemnity, 11.9%–14.5% for permanent partial, and 12.8%–16.6% for temporary partial, producing an overall indemnity-driven uplift of roughly 12.2%–15.3% that, after weighting indemnity’s share of total cost, yielded the 5%–6.3% premium estimate. He said the analysis assumed the change would begin Jan. 1,…