Total Compensation Survey - Key Findings

Key Findings

This preliminary report provides the results of an actual survey of public sector classifications conducted by Cooperative Personnel Services under contract to DPA.

For the private sector data, DPA purchased several licensed reports from reputable professional survey organizations that gather private sector compensation data under conditions of strict confidentiality. However, these private sector sources are limited when it comes to making job-by-job comparisons of total compensation. Despite the limitations, we opted to report this private sector data rather than limit our comparisons to other public sector employers.

Additional study is needed to fill in data gaps and provide a more accurate picture of “total compensation,” as well as vacancy and turnover rates for benchmark classes. In the meantime, we can report the following preliminary findings:

• State salaries and total compensation lead the private sector for clerical jobs, accountants, custodians, and trade classes such as electricians, stationary engineers, but lag behind similar jobs in the public sector.
• The State leads the private sector in its general analyst classifications (such as personnel and budget analyst) and lags other similar jobs in the public sector.
• The State lags in all medical and related occupations. The greatest private sector lag is for occupational therapists, where the lag is 39 percent.
• In the auditor and registered nurse classifications, the State salaries lag behind other employers – public and private. For auditors, the lag is 7 – 8 percent; for RNs, it’s 3 – 5 percent. (These lags do not reflect recent pay increases for RNs resulting from a federal court order.)
• State compensation generally lags the public sector employers surveyed in all benchmark classifications. In most cases, the lag was between 15 and 30 percent.
• The State offers similar health benefits to those of other large private sector employers (1000 or more employees), but exceeds 33 percent of the labor market which offers no health benefits.
• A State retiree eligible for the full employer health contribution in retirement secures an additional $494,000 in compensation over 20 years.
• In information technology, State salaries lag the other public employers in the survey. Comparisons with the private sector are limited given that only one State benchmark class could be matched to a comparable private sector job; in that case, the State salary lag is less than the public sector lag.

Updated October 7, 2010 at 2:26 PM.