Employers nationwide are paying less for workers’ comp coverage, as rating bureaus and state authorities translate improved workplace safety into lower premium rates. But for many employers holding policies with mutual insurers and state-controlled comp entities, lower premiums aren’t the only good news.

Eye-popping dividend payments are putting money back in employers’ coffers in multiple states.

The latest windfall goes to employers insured by Oregon’s State Accident Insurance Fund (SAIF), which approved a $50 million dividend payout for policyholders. Oregon also cut workers’ comp premium rates for employers in 2026 (though a benefit increase will likely nudge rates slightly upward for 2027).

As with other comp success stories, the SAIF’s decision should raise eyebrows for California employers, whose premium rates went up for the second year in a row this month. Justified by largely opaque reports from the state’s Workers’ Compensation Insurance Rating Bureau (WCIRB), California premium hikes buck a positive national trend, arguably without adequate justification.

Almost every other state is keeping employers covered while cutting premiums. Why California employers are paying the fourth-highest premiums for some of the cheapest medical care is a question worth asking, loudly and repeatedly.

OR SAIF: The Latest Comp Dividend Jackpot

SAIF is Oregon’s not-for-profit, state-managed comp insurer (though not the insurer of last resort), covering over half the state’s comp market.

The SAIF board of directors declared the $50 million dividend payment, which will be distributed to 50,138 policyholders in October. It’s the 17th consecutive dividend payout, and the 29th since 1990.

According to an SAIF press release, the dividend results from “favorable reserve development” and “a continued decline in claim frequency,” in keeping with a national trend of apparent workplace safety gains leading to comp relief for employers.

Other state and mutual insurers around the nation have returned sizeable dividends recently, including:

• Texas Mutual, which distributed $300 million in dividends this year
• The Ohio Bureau of Workers’ Compensation will distribute $1 billion in dividends
• The Louisiana Workers’ Compensation Corporation announced $90 million in dividends
• California’s (yes, California’s) State Compensation Insurance Fund (CA State Fund) announced a $200 million dividend

Seriously…What’s Going on in California?

This month, California hit employers with a 6.6% premium rate increase, the second in a row following last year’s 8.7% increase.

As daisyNews has decried, the WCIRB’s rationales for the hikes are arguably thin. Industry experts have credibly accused the WCIRB of “skewing” data to paint a more dire picture of the market, resulting in higher premiums that directly benefit the insurers that fund and control the bureau’s research.

Given the facts on the ground, ballooning premiums for California employers broadly do not appear to make sense. The workers’ comp line of insurance is profitable nationally, with California insurers showing healthy loss ratios. That includes the CA State Fund, which (as noted above) is doing well enough to return hundreds of millions of dollars to its policyholders this year alone.

Between a miserly fee schedule and discount contracting, California provider reimbursements are relatively low. Medical costs are unremarkable. Ill-supported insinuations about Cumulative Trauma and “unlisted” services gesture toward a vaguely alleged crisis of provider overbilling, but fail to account for the fact that no provider can render (or receive reimbursement for) care without payer authorization.

A comprehensive, independent study of California comp costs would shed some light, but that is functionally impossible due to a mind-boggling lack of statewide data.

In other words, California and the WCIRB haven’t made a convincing case to the employers forced to pay more and more for a woefully inefficient comp system.

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