What New Jersey workers' compensation actually pays, and how the weekly figure is built from your wages.

The three benefit types.

Every dollar a New Jersey workers' compensation claim pays falls into one of three categories, each with its own rate and its own measuring stick:

• Temporary disability -- wage replacement while you are out of work and still healing. Paid weekly at 70% of average weekly wage under N.J.S.A. 34:15-12(a)1.
• Permanent disability -- compensation for lasting impairment after you reach maximum medical improvement. Split into permanent partial under N.J.S.A. 34:15-12(c)1 and permanent total under N.J.S.A. 34:15-12(b)1.
• Death and dependency benefits -- paid to dependents when a work injury causes death, under N.J.S.A. 34:15-132.

Temporary disability: 70%, the waiting period, and the 2026 rate.

Temporary disability is the benefit most workers see first. Under N.J.S.A. 34:15-12(a)1, it pays 70% of the weekly wages you were receiving at the time of injury. The statute does not fix that in dollars; it caps the benefit at 75% of the statewide average weekly wage and floors it at 20%, and it directs the Commissioner of Labor and Workforce Development to compute and publish the dollar maximum and minimum every year by September 1, effective the following January 1.

For accidents in 2026, the NJDOL benefit-rate schedule2 sets the maximum temporary/total weekly rate at $1,199 and the minimum at $320. (For context, the 2025 maximum was $1,159 and the 2024 maximum was $1,131.) The rate that governs is the one in effect on your date of accident -- or, for an occupational claim, the date of exposure or manifestation -- so a 2024 injury is valued at the 2024 schedule even if the case is being paid out today.

The seven-day waiting period under N.J.S.A. 34:15-143 trips up workers who expect a check from day one. No temporary compensation accrues until you have been disabled seven days, whether those days are consecutive or not, and the first day you are unable to continue at work counts as one whole day of the waiting period. But the waiting period is conditional, not permanent: the statute provides that 'should the total period of disability extend beyond seven days, additional compensation shall at once become payable covering the above prescribed waiting period.' Once your disability passes the seventh day, the first seven days are owed retroactively. Temporary disability runs until you return to work or reach maximum medical improvement, and it cannot extend beyond 400 weeks.

Permanent partial disability: scheduled vs. non-scheduled.

When you reach maximum medical improvement with lasting impairment, the claim moves to permanent partial disability under N.J.S.A. 34:15-12(c)1. This benefit is not a wage replacement. It is a fixed number of weeks of compensation, set by the statute and scaled by the percentage of disability a physician assigns. There are two tracks.

Scheduled losses cover enumerated body members, each with a base value expressed in weeks of compensation. The verified base figures include:

• Thumb -- 75 weeks
• First (index) finger -- 50 weeks
• Hand -- 245 weeks (calculated on 300 weeks where the loss of function of the hand is 25% or greater)
• Arm -- 330 weeks
• Foot -- 230 weeks (calculated on 285 weeks where the loss of function of the foot is 25% or greater)
• Leg -- 315 weeks
• Loss of vision of an eye -- 200 weeks (plus 25 weeks additional for enucleation)
• Total loss of hearing in one ear -- 60 weeks
• Natural tooth -- 4 weeks each

To value a scheduled award, the percentage of loss of use is multiplied by the scheduled weeks. A 20% loss of use of an arm, for example, is 20% of 330 weeks -- 66 weeks of compensation -- paid at the applicable permanency rate.

Non-scheduled losses are the statute's 'all lesser or other cases' category: injuries that are not assigned to a specific listed member, such as the back, neck, head, and internal organs. These are compensated as a percentage of the partial-total figure on a graduated weeks-and-wage table that runs through 600 weeks. A higher percentage of disability lands higher on the table, where each percentage point is worth more. Because subsection (c) is 'expressly subject to the provisions of R.S. 34:15-37,' the wage that sets the rate is computed under the average-weekly-wage statute, N.J.S.A. 34:15-372.

Permanent total disability.

Permanent total disability under N.J.S.A. 34:15-12(b)1 is for disability that is 'total in character and permanent in quality.' It pays the same 70%-of-wage rate as temporary disability, subject to the same maximum and minimum -- $1,199 and $320 for 2026.

The statute sets a base period of 450 weeks. At the end of 450 weeks, payments cease unless the worker has submitted to the physical or educational rehabilitation ordered by the rehabilitation commission and can show that, because of the disability, it remains impossible to obtain wages or earnings equal to those earned at the time of injury. On that showing, weekly payments continue for the duration of the continued disability. That is the mechanism by which a true permanent-total award extends well past 450 weeks and, in practice, can run for life. Permanent total can arise from a single catastrophic injury or from the combined effect of a work injury with a pre-existing condition -- the latter is where the Second Injury Fund enters the picture.

Death and dependency benefits.

When a compensable work injury causes death, New Jersey pays dependency benefits under N.J.S.A. 34:15-131. The benefit is computed on a flat 70% of the deceased worker's wages for one or more dependents; the older graduated sub-tiers that varied the percentage by the number of dependents were deleted by amendment (P.L. 2003, c. 253). The 70% figure is subject to the same statutory maximum and minimum weekly rates published annually by the NJDOL2.

In addition to the weekly dependency benefit, the statute pays the cost of burial and of a funeral, not to exceed $5,000, to the dependent or other person who paid those costs. (The $5,000 figure reflects the increase enacted by P.L. 2019, which superseded the older $3,500 cap.) Who counts as a dependent, and how the weekly benefit is divided among multiple dependents, is a fact-specific question that frequently determines the value and structure of a death claim.

How average weekly wage is computed.

Average weekly wage is the number every benefit is built on, because temporary, permanent-total, and dependency benefits are all a percentage of it, and permanent-partial rates are derived from it as well. Under N.J.S.A. 34:15-371, 'wages' means the money rate at which the service rendered is recompensed under the contract of hiring in force at the time of the accident. The statute then prescribes how to translate different pay structures into a weekly figure:

• Hourly workers -- the daily wage is the hourly rate multiplied by the customary number of working hours in an ordinary day for that kind of work; the weekly wage is the daily wage multiplied by the customary number of working days in an ordinary week.
• Output or piece-rate work -- the daily wage is the total earned over the preceding six months divided by the number of days actually worked.
• Gratuities -- included only where the employer or employee kept a regular daily or weekly record; the average weekly gratuity over the prior six months (or the entire term of employment, if shorter) is added to the fixed weekly wage.
• Board and lodging -- when furnished by the employer as part of wages, valued at $25.00 per week unless the parties fixed a different value.

Because every benefit flows from this figure, a low or incomplete wage finding suppresses the entire claim. Overtime, recorded tips, a concurrent second job, and the true customary workweek can all move the average weekly wage, and they are worth documenting before the rate is locked in.

SSDI coordination and the New Jersey reverse offset.

A worker who is permanently and totally disabled often qualifies for Social Security Disability (SSDI) as well, and federal law limits the combined total. Under 42 U.S.C. § 424a1, the sum of SSDI and periodic workers' compensation is reduced -- but not below zero -- so that it does not exceed the higher of 80% of the worker's average current earnings before disability or the total SSDI family benefit before reduction.

Normally the Social Security Administration applies that offset by reducing the SSDI check. New Jersey is one of the states that enacted a 'reverse offset' grandfathered by the 1981 federal amendments. Under N.J.S.A. 34:15-95.52, for a worker under age 62 receiving permanent-total benefits under R.S. 34:15-12(b) or Second Injury Fund benefits under R.S. 34:15-95, for periods of disability commencing after December 31, 1979, the New Jersey workers' compensation benefit is reduced by an amount equal to the SSDI benefit. The effect is that New Jersey -- not the SSA -- takes the offset for the overlap, subject to the limits of 42 U.S.C. § 424a1. The reduction does not apply where the combined state and federal benefits stay under the federal cap, and if the claimant refuses to authorize release of the federal benefit information, the Division's estimate of the offset is treated as correct until the actual amount is established.

The reverse offset reaches only permanent-total and Second Injury Fund cases. It does not touch temporary disability or ordinary permanent-partial awards. Because the offset interacts with the timing and structure of an SSDI award, the coordination is worth modeling before a permanency settlement is finalized -- our SSDI practice handles that side of the analysis alongside the comp case.

The Second Injury Fund.

The Second Injury Fund (commonly referred to in practice as the 'One Percent Fund') is established under N.J.S.A. 34:15-951. It solves an apportionment problem. A worker who was already permanently and partially disabled from some earlier cause, and who is then rendered totally disabled by a later work injury, would otherwise leave the current employer liable for the full permanent-total award even though its injury caused only part of the total disability.

The Fund pays permanent-total benefits under R.S. 34:15-12(b) to a worker who becomes totally disabled by a subsequent permanent injury when that worker had previously been permanently and partially disabled from another cause. The current employer pays for the disability its injury actually caused; the Fund covers the portion attributable to the combination with the pre-existing condition. Second Injury Fund benefits are also the category the reverse offset reaches, so they are reduced by the SSDI amount under N.J.S.A. 34:15-95.52 for claimants under 62. Fund claims are technical and adversarial -- the State defends the Fund and contests both the pre-existing disability and the totality of the current condition -- so they typically warrant experienced counsel.

Reconcile the wage record, medical status, and every benefit payment

A benefits review should identify the average weekly wage, the periods the worker could not work, the authorized treatment status, maximum medical improvement, and any claimed permanent disability before accepting a payment or permanency position. Counsel can compare those facts with the temporary rate, permanency schedule, dependency issues, and any SSDI offset. Bring pre-injury pay records, every temporary-disability check or ledger, treatment and work-status notes, permanency evaluations, prior awards, and any Social Security determination. The responsible attorney remains directly involved in the rate, permanency, and settlement decisions rather than handing the benefit analysis wholesale to a junior associate or law clerk.