“Wages-only” labor counts what you pay employees; “fully-loaded” labor adds the employer payroll taxes you pay on top — and only the loaded figure reflects your true cost. The gap between them is exactly the money that leaks when a scheduling tool reports the smaller number and an owner steers by it. This is a recurring theme across restaurant profitability: the honest number is usually the larger, less convenient one.
Related: fully-loaded labor cost · prime cost
→ See it live against sales: payroll