State Salaries Disconnected From Market

During the 1980s, the pay of government employees in the United States rose roughly 70 percent, according to the Washington Research Council.

By contrast, the nonpartisan think tank points out, citing a report by the American Legislative Exchange Council last April, the pay of private employees rose only 50 percent.

“By 1991,” the council goes on, turning to wage levels in this state and citing its own statistics, “average annual compensation for private employees here trailed state workers’ pay by 15 percent.

“Yet, here we have the state personnel department concluding from its salary survey that state classified employees (general civil service employees) average 11 percent below market.”

The survey by state officialdom doesn’t offer a direct comparison, the research council notes. Costly benefits packages that all state workers enjoy - and relatively far fewer private workers receive from employers - aren’t included in the state figures.

Figuring in the hefty benefits packages of government workers, the research council says, “presumably would close the gap” with private workers.

And then some, I have no doubt.

But be that as it may, the research council says, “the findings startle many outside government.”

Indeed, they call to mind that old saying: Figures don’t lie. But liars figure.

“For example,” says the research council, “according to the (state’s) salary survey, liquor store clerks are paid 12.5 percent below market.

“But when privatization was suggested,” the research council observes, “one of the major problems the proposal faced was protecting the generally higher wages and benefits paid liquor store clerks.”

State union leaders wouldn’t allow Gov. Mike Lowry to pitch “privatization” of liquor sales by selling store franchises - unless private operators were forced to hire government workers at existing wages and benefits.

This action speaks for itself.

A senate committee killed the phony “privatization” scheme.

Meantime, Lowry is proposing to hike the pay of government employees - who, it must be recognized, didn’t receive increases in the 1993-1995 biennium - by 6 percent in the 1995-1997 biennium.

Says the research council, “Benchmarking undoubtedly has some value. Testing against the competition is one way to anticipate and avoid difficulty in filling critical positions.

“However, the state has yet to demonstrate widespread problems with personnel recruitment and retention.”

Far from it. State jobs are fat jobs, in high demand - at least they are anywhere east of the Cascades.

“Besides,” says the research council, “the (ballyhooed) austerity of the last two years has been exaggerated. Thirty-eight percent of state employees received a salary increase between June 1993 and June 1994, with about a fifth of the total receiving automatic or “step” increases of either 2.5 or 5 percent.”

Concludes the research council, “Too often, compensation discussions degenerate into public employee bashing, a disservice to the thousands of teachers and government workers who truly fulfill the ideal of public service. Like any large organization, government has its share of angels and devils.

“Problems come when public-private competition is thwarted by personnel law and large groups of employees who advance lock-step through a compensation system with little apparent regard for performance or markets.”

Amen.

The cost of living in Spokane relative to the rest of the country may have plateaued in the second half of last year and is edging down.

On a scale where 100 percent is average, the cost of living in Spokane peaked in the second quarter of last year at 108.7 percent.

Spokane living costs eased to 106.2 percent of the national average in the third quarter, according to the Cost of Living Index for U.S. Metropolitan Cities.

Groceries, transportation and miscellaneous costs in Spokane continued slightly below average. Utilities are just 57 percent of average. Health care continues one-fourth higher than the nation; housing, one-third higher.

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The following fields overflowed: CREDIT = Frank Bartel The Spokesman-Review