The Workers' Compensation Research Institute (WCRI), anindependent, not-for-profit research organization that providesinformation about public policy issues involving workers'compensation systems, has released the eighth edition of itsCompScope report. In this edition, two main questions are examined:How does the performance of a state system compare with that ofother states and how is workers' compensation system performancechanging over time?

The states included in this edition are Arkansas, California,Florida, Illinois, Indiana, Louisiana, Maryland, Massachusetts,Michigan, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, Tennessee, Texas, andWisconsin, which WCRI says represent more than 50 percent of thenation's workers' compensation benefit payments. The report canhelp policymakers and others benchmark a state's system performanceor a company's workers' compensation program. They said thebenchmarks they provide also offer an excellent baseline fortracking the effectiveness of policy changes and identifyingimportant trends.

Below are a few of the findings and conclusions reached, whichused claims filed between 2000 and 2005.

?Overall costs per claim in Massachusetts were typical among the14 study states. When examining changes over time, however, thestudy found that costs per claim grew rapidly in four out of fivestudy years, including a nearly 10 percent increase in the mostrecent year (2005 claims evaluated in mid 2006). This recent growthwas driven by rapid increases in medical costs per claim (nearly 11percent); indemnity benefits per claim with more than seven days oflost time (10 percent increase); and the cost of delivering medicaland indemnity benefits to injured workers (nine percentincrease).

?Injured workers received their first indemnity payments fasterin Wisconsin than in most other study states. Fifty-three percentof injured workers in Wisconsin were issued their first checkswithin 21 days of injury, compared to the 14-state median of 41percent. Faster payments may have been influenced by the stateagency's efforts to monitor timely payments and to provide payorswith feedback about their performance.

?Two offsetting factors were at work in Maryland, which largelyexplained why the overall costs per claim in Maryland were typicalof the states in the study. Medical costs per claim with more thanseven days of lost time in Maryland were among the lowest of thestudy states--33 percent lower than the 14-state median. However,the state had a higher proportion of claims that received incomebenefits (claims with more than seven days of lost time)--8percentage points higher than the 14-state median of 21percent.

?The average cost per claim of delivering medical and incomebenefits to injured workers in Pennsylvania was 22 percent higherthan the typical study state for 2003 claims with more than sevendays of lost time (evaluated in mid 2006), driven mainly by higherlitigation expenses. Although Pennsylvania was not among the mostlitigious states in the study, defense attorney payments were 34percent higher than the 14-state median. These higher payments mayindicate that more hours of billable time were required to resolvecases in Pennsylvania, suggesting that the state has a somewhatmore expensive and complex dispute resolution process.

For more information, go to www.wcrinet.org.

CompScope(TM) Benchmarks: Multistate Comparisons, 8th Edition.Carol A. Telles, Rui Yang, Evelina Radeva, Ramona P. Tanabe.January 2008. WC-08-12

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