To show with what varying impact social security taxes will fall upon employers, the Manhattan brokerage house of Weingarten & Co. last week issued a table of the ratio of labor costs to total business in a score of industries. Labor costs mean wages, and wages are what employers will pay taxes on—in 1937, 2% for unemployment insurance, i% for old age insurance. Averaging for the last 20 years.
Weingarten found these percentages of labor costs to volume of business:
Sugar Refining............................................. 3.8
Smelting & Refining............................................. 5.6
Meat packing............................................. 6.2
Cigarets.............................................6.2
Automobile Manufacturing ................................................. 10.0
Tires................................................
