Federal pay ahead of private industry

Federal employees earn higher average salaries than private-sector workers in more than eight out of 10 occupations, a USA TODAY analysis of federal data finds.Accountants, nurses, chemists, surveyors, cooks, clerks and janitors are among the wide range of jobs that get paid more on average in the federal government than in the private sector.

Overall, federal workers earned an average salary of $67,691 in 2008 for occupations that exist both in government and the private sector, according to Bureau of Labor Statistics data. The average pay for the same mix of jobs in the private sector was $60,046 in 2008, the most recent data available.

These salary figures do not include the value of health, pension and other benefits, which averaged $40,785 per federal employee in 2008 vs. $9,882 per private worker, according to the Bureau of Economic Analysis.

Someone will have to refresh my memory about how this isn’t really as it appears. If memory serves, this subject was broached here some time ago and there were a few gubment workers who disagreed with the numbers for some reason.

During my working career, I always thought of private versus public sector work as being a trade-off between higher pay and better job security with slightly better benefits.

Now it looks as though you get all three.