Government
payrolls edge up

State officials contend that
education costs have offset
reductions in other departments

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By Craig Gima
cgima@starbulletin.com

The number and cost of state and county jobs in Hawaii increased at a pace below the national average from March 2000 to March 2001, according to U.S. Census Bureau figures released today.

The annual report on state and local public employment shows the number of full-time equivalent positions in state and county government increased by about 0.23 percent to 69,230 in 2001 from 69,078 in 2000 while March payroll rose in 2001 by about $2 million to $207.8 million from $205.7 million in March 2000 -- a 0.97 percent increase.

Nationwide, the Census Bureau reports, state and local governments employed 15.4 million full-time equivalent workers -- a 2 percent increase over 2000.

The number of full-time equivalent employees is compiled by taking the number of hours worked by part-time employees divided by the hours in a full-time work week and adding the equivalent full-time positions to the number of full-time workers.

From 1997, when the Census Bureau first started using the month of March to compare public sector employment, through 2001, state and county government employment increased 5 percent and payroll costs increased 13.7 percent. The per-capita number of state and county employees to the general population increased to 5.7 percent in 2001 from 5.6 percent of the population in 1998.

Lowell Kalapa, director of the Hawaii Tax Foundation, says Gov. Ben Cayetano should not claim he has reduced the size of government if the number of public employees and the payroll continues to increase.

"Don't let the rooster crow about something the numbers say the opposite," Kalapa said.

But state Human Resources Director Davis Yogi said the Cayetano administration has reduced staffing in other state departments except for positions related to the Felix consent decree and education.

Since 1994, when Cayetano took office, according to Human Resources Department statistics, other departments besides education and health have seen a 12.1 percent decrease in staffing.

"The size of executive branches has been shrinking," Yogi said, "The biggest growth has been in the Felix compliance issue and in education with the opening up of new schools."

According to census figures from October 1994, there were 67,486 full-time equivalent state and county employees. By October 1995, that number had been reduced to 65,458. Figures are not available for 1996 because the government changed the way it reported figures from employment in October to employment in March.

Over the five-year period between 1997 and 2001, staffing at public schools increased to 25,378 from 22,900 full-time equivalent positions and payroll has increased to $67,101,646 a month from $55,274,256 a month, according to the Census Bureau.

Paul Brewbaker, chief economist with Bank of Hawaii, says the growth of salaries in the public sector between 1997 and 2001 is roughly equivalent to the growth in the private sector.

His calculations show a 2.3 percent annual state and local government payroll increase adjusted for inflation between March 1997 and March 2001. According to most recently available statistics, private sector payroll increased about 2.7 percent between the fourth quarter of 1996 and the fourth quarter of 2001 after inflation.

But Brewbaker says he is worried about the current growth in government. State Department of Labor figures, which may be reflected in next year's census report, show private sector jobs decreased by 2.6 percent between March 2001 and March 2002, while state and county jobs increased by 4 percent.

"It's something that cannot be sustained if maintaining fiscal balance within government is an objective," he said.