Maine Painting Workers Comp Rates (2026)
Maine does not publish its painting class figures online. Across the 26 states that do, the median typical premium is about $4.43 per $100 of payroll. Ask a carrier or the state's rating bureau for the current Maine figure.
No official Maine figure is available online, so the numbers below use the US median of the states that publish one.
Maine class code for painting
- 5474: Painting NOC & Shop Operations, Drivers
- 5037 (Painting: Metal Structures - Over Two Stories in Height & Drivers)
- 5491 (Paperhanging & Drivers)
Painting carries ladder fall risk, solvent exposure and lead paint hazards in buildings built before 1978.
What comp costs per painter in Maine
The Bureau of Labor Statistics counts 2,120 painters on payrolls in Maine (May 2025), the 28th largest workforce among the 50 states and DC. The median wage is $28.50 an hour, 20% above the US median of $23.75.
This trade is a bigger part of the Maine job market than it is nationally: painters hold 2.3 times their national share of jobs there.
At the US median of $4.43 per $100 of payroll (Maine does not publish its figure online), comp on one worker at that wage costs about $1.26 for every hour worked, or $2,626 a year full time. A 3-person crew comes to roughly $7,878 a year in premium before any experience mod.
Because premium is charged on payroll, who you hire moves the bill. Maine pay runs from $22.75 an hour at the 10th percentile to $36.31 at the 90th, so the same rate costs $1.01 an hour on a new hire and $1.61 on a senior hand.
Workers comp requirements in Maine
- Coverage required: 1 employee
- Owners and sole proprietors: Owners of 20%+ may waive in writing; LLC members opt out without a written waiver
- State fund: Private market; MEMIC (employer-owned mutual) is the residual carrier
- Waiting period: 7 days; retroactive if incapacity exceeds 14 days
- Penalty for going without: Knowing failure is a Class D crime; civil penalty up to $10,000 or 108% of the avoided premium
Maine's entire residual market runs through one employer-owned mutual, MEMIC, created after the state's early-1990s coverage crisis.
What moves a painting comp bill
- Painting rates are set by height and surface: interior repaint work and exterior or industrial painting can fall into different classes in many states. Describe your mix accurately at quote time.
- Ladder and scaffold falls are the costly claims. Scaffold training and inspection logs help when you ask a carrier for safety credits.
- Painting crews lean on 1099 labor. Without a certificate of insurance on file, the auditor will add those payments to your payroll.
- Seasonal exterior work makes payroll hard to forecast. Estimate the year, not your busiest month, so the deposit and the audit stay close.