PAY COMPARABILITY IN STATE GOVERNMENTS

Earnings differentials between state government and private industry e mployees are estimated for each state using 1990 Census data. Female e mployees in most state governments receive higher earnings than compar able private sector employees, whereas the opposite result applies to males. However the size of the state government earnings advantage or penalty is not uniform across states for either sex. The relative earn ings of state employees increase with their membership in unions and w ith the revenues generated by state government's tar and financing pol icies.