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POLICY INSIGHT
BEYOND THE NUMBERS

Five Things You Might Not Know About Public Employees

Our updated short report on state and local workers includes some basic facts worth keeping in mind in debates over public employees.

1. Education is by far the largest category of state and local government employment. Nearly 7 million teachers, aides, and support staff work in the nation’s public elementary and secondary schools, more than twice as many as in the next largest job category (protective services, which includes police officers, fire fighters, and correctional officers).

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2. Outside of education, the public workforce has shrunk as a share of the population over the last three decades. Counting education, the number of state and local workers has grown modestly relative to the overall population, from about 59 per 1,000 in 1980 to 61 per 1,000 in 2011.

3. Public-sector workers earn less than their private-sector counterparts. The typical middle-wage worker earns about 4 percent less in the public sector than the private sector.   Low-wage state and local workers, by contrast, receive a small wage premium (see graph).

4. Public-sector workers also earn less than their private-sector counterparts when one counts both wages and benefits. Benefits like pensions and health insurance are more generous and secure for public employees than for most private-sector workers, but factoring in the value of these benefits does not eliminate the gap between state and local employees and their counterparts in comparable private-sector jobs.

5. Labor costs make up a significant share of state and local spending. This reflects the fact that providing services is the primary business of states as well as school districts, cities, counties, and other local governments. Total compensation for state and local workers (including wages and benefits) makes up about 44 percent of state and local spending.