Tracy Ryan, Andrea Coleman, and Jeremy Attie closed AIS 2026 with a panel that made one case more clearly than any session in recent memory: workers’ comp is a federation, not a system. Senior Solutions Advisor Ryan Smith reads what the three-bureau dynamic means for carriers running across NCCI states, California, and New York.
Stephen Cooper opened his AIS 2026 economy update with an uncomfortable truth: 2025 saw the slowest U.S. job growth outside a recession in more than two decades, but workers’ comp kept turning. Senior Solutions Advisor Ryan Smith reads what Cooper’s data means for premium, frequency, and severity heading into 2026.
Workers’ comp is priced off payroll and shaped by employment patterns. When the economy shifts, carriers feel it — sometimes immediately, sometimes with a lag. Here’s how to read macro trends before they hit your book.