They would here, too, *except* they could get paid a lot more
elsewhere, even as a contract employee.
Yeah, but after working for a local government for a time, the key isn't
the salary - it's the PENSION. Keep your head down, don't make waves,
last 5 years and you could start collecting a pension when you retire.
The floor was something like 5% after 5 years, scaling upwards every
year. 5 percent of your salary FOR LIFE. Once you get in the habit of
doing just enough to not get fired and don't come onto anyone's radar,
the years just keep piling up.
That depends on the state you live in. States like Kentucky and Illinois,
who were busy cutting benefits for new hires vs. funding their obligation to retirement, and then trying to get the fed government to allow them to
declare the system bankrupt, are not good places to go like they might have been in the 1990's and before.
Kentucky cut out the 5% annual COLA increment/increase 20 years ago. They didn't really cut it out, they just quit paying it about the same time they quit paying their retirement funding obligation. One year, someone
realized they had a whole group of people who had not got raises in years
had fallen UNDER the federal poverty level. So they got just enough of
an increase (only that group, and not anywhere near the cost of living) to
get them back above the poverty level. IIRC, it may have happened twice.
Until a year ago, very few long term employees that had less than 20 years experience had ever got any kind of annual increment or cost of living pay increases during their entire state government career, beyond the initial
5% they got for making it to the end of probation. The only pension most
of them will get is what they put in their 401 or 457 account which, unless they were smart and moved a bunch of their money to the low-but-guaranteed
fix rate option, is not looking real good lately.
I doubt KY is the only state government where this has become true, but
about the only people who they can recruit and keep now are people who
cannot hold down a job anywhere else, people who are married to someone
that has a good paying job with good benefits, or people who are holding
down 2 (or more) jobs. The rest stay long enough to get experience and then leave for someplace with better pay, benefits, and maybe even full-time remote work.
The only IT staff they hire now are contract employees.
* SLMR 2.1a * 2 + 2 = 5 for extremely large values of 2.
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