Employment

The State is the largest or the single most important employer in almost all countries. Thus, public sector reforms have an enormous impact on the labour market in all countries that implement reforms. The public service personnel comprise persons employed by public authorities at central/federal, regional/provincial/state and local/municipal levels and include both public servants (to whom specific regulations apply) and public employees. There are also an increasing number of workers employed in public services operated by the private sector. The current debates centre on the questions of how far the State should and can introduce market-type mechanisms, involve private contractors, or privatize in order to ensure an effective and efficient provision of services in the public interest. There is no one-size fits-all answer. How best to provide different public services to citizens of diversified and changing needs has to be discussed in an open forum involving all the stakeholders who will be affected by the decision taken.

Assessing the development of employment in the public service is difficult because in many countries separate statistics are not available on the various activities undertaken by the private and public providers. It is even more difficult to describe statistically developments at the municipal services level. Furthermore, outsourcing as the main form of private provision of municipal services, often takes place over very limited periods of time and is thus not reflected in statistical data.

ILO’s most recent statistics on public sector employment may be found in the public sector employment database (PSEDB), updated in 2006. The ILO’s Bureau of Statistics provides detailed information on public sector employment by country in the LaborStat database.

Useful links/resources

• The World Bank
• Organisation for Economic and Co-operation and Development (OECD)