No longer an alternative: more Utah companies provide domestic partner benefits.

• Author: Vanek, Jeff
• Position: Focus

For many employees, an important part of their overall compensation is the company benefits package, particularly employer-provided health insurance. Benefits can be a key consideration for an employee when deciding to stay with a current job or take a new one.

Employee benefits fall into two general categories: retirement benefits and so-called health and welfare benefits. Retirement benefits include 401(k) plans, IRA accounts or pension plans.

Health and welfare benefits typically include health, employee life, accidental death and dismemberment, and short-term disability insurances. Paid sick leave, vision, dental insurance and long-term elder care are also common health and welfare benefits.

A growing trend among companies is to not only make these types of benefits available to employees, their spouses and their dependents, but also to an employee's domestic partner.

Into the Mainstream

Domestic partnership benefits are referred to as an alternative benefit, meaning a benefit less commonly offered by companies. Other alternative benefits may include things like daycare, subsidized childcare and discounts for products and services.

Domestic partnerships, however, may not be so "alternative" these days. As of the latest report from the Corporate Equity Index, compiled by the Human Rights Campaign Foundation, 62 percent of Fortune 500 companies offer domestic partner health benefits to employees. The U.S. Department of Labor reports that 31 percent of employers in the country offer the benefit.

In Utah, 25 percent of Utah respondents provide domestic partner benefits, according to The Employers Council's 20132014 National & Utah Policies & Benefits Survey. Each year the number of companies that offer domestic partner benefits has increased, both nationally and locally.

Alternative is becoming the norm.

Although gay and lesbian advocacy groups have championed extending benefits to domestic partners, the issue goes beyond sexual orientation and it affects more people than one might realize. According to the U.S. Census Bureau report, America's Families and Living Arrangements: 2010, unmarried households made up 45 percent of all U.S. households. Often, employees who elect to provide insurance to their domestic partner do so for an opposite sex partner.

Companies in Utah that offer domestic partnership benefits have typically been larger out-of-state headquartered employers such as American Express and ADP. Even so, more and more Utah-based...