State and local government hiring has lagged the economic recovery from the COVID pandemic, a new report says.
And Georgia has seen a bigger decline in non-education state and local government jobs than most states in the Southeast, according to the report by The Pew Charitable Trusts.
The public policy non-profit looked at the number of non-school, state and local government jobs — from police officers and prison guards to library and roads workers — before the pandemic and this summer.
It found overall payrolls were down by about 400,000 jobs nationally and are about where they were at the low point of the Great Recession. As of August, local public non-school payrolls were down 5.3% from pre-pandemic levels.
In Georgia, those jobs fell 4.4% between July 2019 and this July, from 245,500 to 234,600.
The biggest decline in percentage terms was in New Mexico, where the drop was 8.5%. A few states have seen an increase, with Rhode Island, at 1.5%, the biggest gainer.
Nationally, the biggest percentage drops were in government jobs related to the hospitality industry and recreation, although prison/jail and executive and legislative office jobs saw a sizable decline as well. In some cases, the layoffs may be temporary and due to a shutdown of services during the pandemic.
Many state and local governments shed jobs or furloughed workers when the pandemic hit as they feared a recession and a big loss of tax revenue.
However, tax revenues in states like Georgia skyrocketed last fiscal year, in part due to record spending by the federal government to cushion the financial blows caused by the pandemic.
State and local governments have also seen a steady stream of retirements and other turnover, and the report said they are finding it difficult to fill jobs in areas such as health care, road maintenance and corrections.
State agencies in Georgia were already cutting unfilled jobs before the pandemic in an effort to meet Gov. Brian Kemp’s call to slash budgets. Kemp asked for the spending reductions in late 2019 because he feared an economic slowdown.
Some agencies, such as the Department of Corrections and Juvenile Justice, used some of the savings from not filling jobs to give pay raises to employees in hopes of reducing turnover rates. But critics say the low staffing levels have created dangerous conditions. In the Georgia Department of Corrections fiscal year 2020 report, it reported 608 fewer officers last year than in 2019, with a 44% turnover.
The U.S. Department of Justice on Tuesday announced an investigation into violence and conditions inside Georgia prisons.
The change in the number of non-school state and local government jobs between July 2019 and this July in the Southeast, according to a report by The Pew Charitable Trusts
Louisiana
-7.5%
Georgia
-4.4%
Mississippi
-4.3%
Tennessee
-2.4%
Alabama
-1.8%
Florida
-0.8%
South Carolina, North Carolina
-0.7%
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