Labor burden calculator
The wage is not what an hour costs you. Add payroll taxes, workers' comp, benefits, and overhead to see your true, fully burdened cost per hour — the number you should bid labor at. No signup.
Your numbers
Burden is everything you pay on top of the wage. Adjust these to your business:
True cost of an hour
If you bid labor at the bare wage of $0.00/hr, you're leaving out $0.00/hr of real cost — that gap is where jobs quietly lose money.
Use this loaded rate in your estimates — or let Sevyn carry it for you and pull your real costs from your bank so every job's profit is bank-true.
Start free →What is labor burden?
Labor burden is everything you pay on top of a worker's wage to actually employ them: payroll taxes (FICA, FUTA/SUTA), workers' compensation, benefits, and a share of your overhead (truck, tools, admin). A typical construction burden runs roughly 25–40% on top of the base wage — so a $30/hr worker can really cost you $38–42/hr.
Why it matters for your bids
If you estimate labor at the bare wage, every hour is under-costed by your full burden — and across a job's worth of hours that's a serious chunk of margin gone before you start. Bid at the burdened rate instead. Then see how it flows into a whole job with the job profit calculator, or read how Sevyn keeps your real costs current straight from your bank instead of QuickBooks tagging.