Coverage
The five states could not be further apart on this line. One of them will not let a private carrier write it at all.
Workers’ compensation is the line where these five states diverge most sharply. California has just made a lapse a five-figure licensing problem. Washington does not have a private market for it. Arizona exempts owners with no W-2 employees. Getting this wrong is not a coverage gap — in two of the five it is a license problem.
The same line, governed five different ways. Each state page publishes the sources behind these figures.
The most time-sensitive of the five. Since 1 January 2026, SB 291 has set minimum penalties for workers’ compensation violations at $10,000 for a sole proprietor and $20,000 for other contractors, and bars CSLB from renewing or reinstating a license previously in violation until a current certificate of insurance or self-insurance is filed. C-8, C-20, C-22, C-39 and C-61/D-49 must carry it with or without employees today; from 1 January 2028 that extends to every classification, the only exemption being a joint venture with no employees that files a certificate of exemption. That date was 2026 until SB 1455 moved it.
All California requirements →Bought in the private market, quoted alongside the general liability. Oregon is not a monopolistic state, so the comp and the liability can sit with markets chosen on their merits rather than one being dictated by the state.
All Oregon requirements →Washington is one of four monopolistic states, with Ohio, North Dakota and Wyoming. Workers’ compensation must be bought from the state fund through L&I and cannot be written by a private carrier — not by ALKEME and not by anyone else. Any broker offering to place Washington comp is describing something that does not exist. What a broker does here is the liability, the registration bond and the rest of the program, and helps you get the L&I risk classes right, because those drive the rate you pay the state.
All Washington requirements →Required of every Louisiana employer with one or more employees, including part-time and seasonal, with no exceptions to that rule. On top of that, residential and home-improvement licensees must file proof of it before the license issues and keep it continuous for the life of the license — so in Louisiana a comp lapse is simultaneously an uninsured exposure and a licensing exposure.
All Louisiana requirements →Mandatory under A.R.S. § 23-961 for any contractor with one or more employees. Sole proprietors, partners and corporate officers with no W-2 employees are not required to carry it — which makes Arizona the most forgiving of the five for an owner-operator, right up until the first hire.
All Arizona requirements →Tell us the trade, the state and the payroll. We will tell you which markets fit before we submit anywhere.
