Which type of insurance coverage is a contractor required to carry for its employees on a California public works project, just as on private jobs?

Explanation

Workers' compensation is the answer, and it follows the employees, not the kind of project: Labor Code §3700 requires every employer to secure it, and B&P §7125(a) makes a current Certificate of Workers' Compensation Insurance, or a Certification of Self-Insurance from the Director of Industrial Relations, a condition precedent to the issuance, reinstatement, reactivation, renewal or continued maintenance of a licence. Until January 1, 2028, §7125(b) lets a licensee with no employees file an exemption statement instead — unless it holds a C-8, C-20, C-22, C-39 or D-49 classification, which must carry coverage regardless; from January 1, 2028 the SB 216 version, postponed by SB 1455 (Stats. 2024, ch. 485), requires coverage of every licensee except a §7029 joint venture with no employees. A public agency therefore cannot award to a contractor whose required coverage has lapsed, because §7125.2 suspends the licence itself. The three wrong answers are real policies that answer other risks: title insurance covers defects in ownership of land, builder's risk covers physical loss to the work under construction, and key-person life insurance pays the business on the death of an owner or manager. None of them pays an injured worker.