U.S. Insurance Industry Cuts 6,200 Jobs in February

 

Saturday, Mar 07,2009, 3:49:04 PM   Click:

U.S. Insurance Industry Cuts 6,200 Jobs in February Raymond J Lehmann
U.S. insurance payrolls shed 6,200 positions in February, as total unemployment surged to its highest rate since 1983, according to seasonally adjusted data released March 6 by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.

For the month, the industry's payrolls fell to 2.282 million from 2.288 million in January, as the number of insurance jobs now has contracted in six of the past seven months. The agency's revised figures for January showed the industry had 1,000 fewer positions than the 2.289 million previously reported.

Total nonfarm payrolls were down 651,000 in January. That would have been the worst single month drop since 1949, but BLS' revised numbers for December 2008 showed the economy actually suffered 681,000 job losses that month. Those numbers bring to 4.4 million the number of jobs lost since the start of the recession in December 2007, with roughly half the total coming in the past three months, BLS reported. The jobless rate climbed to 8.1%, as the total number of unemployed is now 12.5 million.

Year-over-year, insurance payrolls fell 1.1% from the 2.307 million jobs the industry reported in February 2008, compared with a 3.0% decline for nonfarm payrolls. The financial services sector was down 44,000 jobs from January to February, and the sector has shed 297,000 jobs over the past year, a 3.1% drop.

Total insurance industry payrolls are reported on a seasonally adjusted basis, along with the current month's nonfarm payrolls, the first Friday of each month. Separately, data by industry segment — broken out by various insurance carrier and noncarrier categories — are available only on an unadjusted basis for the prior month.

Based on the just-released January 2009 data, health insurer payrolls grew the most of the past year, up 4.5% from January 2008 to 457,300. Payrolls for reinsurers rose 2.5% to 29,100, while life insurers were up 0.3% to 354,700 and those in the "other" segment were up 0.8% to 53,200.

Every other segment of the industry saw job losses, with the most severe cuts, once again, in the title insurance segment. Title insurers have shed 19.4% of their work force since January 2008, starting 2009 with 67,300 employees.

Job losses also were seen among third-party administrators, down 3.8% to 125,500; claims adjusters, down 2.6% to 52,300; agents and brokers, down 1.7% to 658,500; and property/casualty insurers, down 1.5% to 482,400.

Average weekly earnings for the industry's nonsupervisory positions rose 5.7% from January 2008 to January 2009, from $828.07 to $875.45, with wages rising in all but one of the eight industry categories. Wages for TPAs fell 3.2% to $745.38 a week.

adminMaking the biggest gains in earnings were life insurance employees, up 9.7% to $964.03. Also gaining were employees of health insurers, up 9.0% to $943.24; reinsurers, up 6.1% to $796.32; title insurers, up 5.1% to $800.36; property/casualty insurers, up 4.3% to $987.62; and agents and brokers, up 3.2% to $745.38.

(By R.J. Lehmann, Washington bureau manager: raymond.lehmann@ambest.com)

Copyright © 2009 A.M. Best Company, Inc. U.S. insurance payrolls shed 6,200 positions in February, as total unemployment surged to its highest rate since 1983, according to seasonally adjusted data released March 6 by the U.S.