Employment in the public sector

Abstract

Governments are responsible for a wide variety of tasks: regulating society and the economy, delivering public services, such as education, health, justice, policing, transportation, etc. as well and redistributing income via social benefits (e.g. pensions, unemployment insurance, etc.). These functions can be carried out by different levels of government and in some countries government also owns and operates key enterprises (e.g. state–owned enterprises). These tasks are primarily carried out by public employees, including doctors, nurses, teachers, policemen, policy advisors, and economists, to name a few key public sector occupations. As a result, the size of the public sector employment and its share in total employment is an indicator of the size of the government and its weight in a country’s economy. However, outsourcing some of these functions is an increasing trend in many governments. In this case the costs are covered by government, but those who carry out these tasks are not considered public employees. This way the more stringent employment laws related to public employees or civil servants do not apply, providing greater flexibility to the government employer. As a result, to understand more completely the size of the public sector in the economy, both public expenditures and public employment data need to be considered.

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