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 | | City | | % of salary* | | Brownsville, TX | 4.6% | | Rochester, NY | 4.5% | | Honolulu, HI | 4.4% | | Riverside, CA | 4.4% | | Albany, NY | 4.3% | | New York, NY | 4.1% | | Springfield, MA | 4.1% | | Orlando, FL | 4.1% | | Richmond, VA | 4.1% | | Pensacola, FL | 4.0% |
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| * Based on average worker/year and using a gas price of $2.81 a gallon. | | Source: Salary.com, October 2005 |
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NEW YORK (CNN/Money) -
Commuters who drive to work are pumping their salary raises into their gas tanks, according to a new report issued Wednesday.
The average worker spends 3.3 percent, or $1,341, of their annual pay on gasoline, according to compensation firm Salary.com. After the gas bill is paid, the firm says the average worker's annual pay raise of 3.7 percent is virtually wiped out.
If gas prices go even higher to $5 a gallon, American workers will be spending almost 6 percent of their annual salary on gas for commuting, Salary.com said.
Salary.com assumed average fuel economy of 17.8 miles/gallon and used current gas prices of $2.81 a gallon to make its calculations.
According to the survey, commuters in Brownsville, Texas are hurt the worst, spending about 4.6 percent of their annual salaries on gas. Drivers in Rochester, N.Y. took the No. 2 spot by pumping 4.5 percent of their pay into their tanks, and commuters in Honolului are also feeling the pain, rounding out the top three with 4.4 percent.
Gasoline prices have risen nearly 45 percent in the last year, according to AAA's daily fuel report.
Minimum-wage employees earning $5.15 an hour are also among the hardest hit by soaring gas prices. Salary.com estimates about 11.3 percent of their salary is being pumped into the gas tank each year.
One way employees can cope with gas pains is by trying to secure a raise, said Bill Coleman, senior vice president of compensation at Salary.com.
"Human Resource managers definitely empathize with their employees when they are forced to use parts of their total rewards package, like their annual merit increase, to cover things like rises in commuting costs," he said.
But Coleman added, since employers aren't likely to be able to offer raises to cover every worker's gas costs, employees should emphasize their individual contributions when asking for a raise.
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