Nearly one in eight employees left their state jobs last year for retirement, another job or other reasons, with one in five workers in some health care fields departing. Credit: Mike De Sisti

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Madison— The stream of workers leaving state agencies last year gushed at the highest level seen in at least a decade, driven by an improving economy that is making private employers more attractive in relation to their counterparts in government.

Nearly one in eight employees left their state jobs last year for retirement, another job or other reasons, with one in five workers in some health care fields departing. In all, 3,600 workers outside of the University of Wisconsin System moved on from their state jobs in 2015, which was 23% more than 2014 and nearly twice as many as in 2010.

The numbers, released to the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel through an open records request, don't explain on their own why more workers are leaving or show that Wisconsin government is any worse than state governments around the country.

It's clear that a big part of the trend can be explained by an improving economy that's giving workers more job opportunities than several years ago, when state employees hunkered down and generally didn't leave their jobs for reasons other than retirement.

"We're seeing a definite trend in that it's difficult to recruit and retain state workers (nationally). It's due in significant part to compensation. In some parts of the country, it's not competing with market rates in the private sector," said Leslie Scott, executive director of the National Association of State Personnel Executives.

But the figures also add fire to an ongoing debate about whether stagnant wages and changes to union rules have made state government a less attractive employer to its workforce. Though controlling labor costs can be good for taxpayers, higher turnover, vacant jobs and the learning curve for new workers can also drive up overtime and training costs and affect public services.

With the baby boom generation also hitting retirement age, the loss of experienced workers is likely to remain an issue for the state for some time to come. Citing that problem and the need for more efficient hiring practices, Gov. Scott Walker in February signed a broad overhaul of the state's century-old system of merit hiring and firing.

"These reforms will allow us to better compete with the private sector and recruit the best and the brightest state employees to ensure we are providing high quality state services to citizens. These reforms also give agencies more tools to retain employees while allowing the state to hire more quickly and efficiently, which will help mitigate" departures, Walker administration spokeswoman Laurel Patrick said.

During the Great Recession, new opportunities for workers and turnover in state government both plummeted, dropping in 2010 to 1,821 civil servants, or 6% of the state workforce, who left their non-university jobs for a variety of reasons, from retirements and resignations to terminations, layoffs and death. The figures don't include workers who took a different state job, and the numbers don't differentiate between resignations and firings.

In 2011, Walker signed the law known as Act 10, repealing most union bargaining for most public workers and increasing state workers' benefit contributions by an amount equal to about 8.5% of take-home pay. That year, retirements jumped as employees sought to avoid fundamental changes to their retirement benefits, which didn't end up materializing. But with the recession still deep, relatively few employees resigned to take other jobs.

The state offered across-the-board raises of 1% in 2014 and 2015, along with some merit increases for select employees, but no increases in the current two-year budget.

Improved hiring climate

As the unemployment rate has dropped and hiring has risen across the nation, more and more state workers are leaving for reasons other than retirement — 2,300 of them in Wisconsin in 2015, or more than in any other year in the available records going back to 2005. In all, 12% of the state's civil servants left state employment last year for all reasons, including retirement.

Turnover rates rise even higher in some health care jobs for the state such as doctors and personal care technicians. Scott said other high areas of turnover nationally include prison guards, information technology workers and financial professionals.

Good comparison numbers aren't readily available for state governments nationally, but Scott said she doesn't believe Wisconsin is an outlier. In February 2014, Governing magazine reported that states such as Montana, Georgia and Louisiana had all seen turnover rates of 13% or higher in recent years.

Figures from the federal Bureau of Labor Statistics show even higher turnover rates for state and local governments around the country but those figures aren't an apples to apples comparison because they include seasonal and temporary workers, while Wisconsin's figures are for permanent workers.

Christopher Taber, a labor economist at UW-Madison, notes that the higher turnover today is partially due to pent-up demand that built up during the recession. For example, a worker who wanted to take a job closer to his or her family may not have been able to do so in 2010 but now has a better chance, he said.

"In general this is a good thing. This is a sign that the economy is improving," Taber said.

Rick Badger, executive director of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees in Wisconsin, sees another factor at play: the effects of years of cost-cutting measures.

"This does add a little more credence to what we're saying that people are not feeling valued and they vote with their feet," Badger said.

Scott said some other challenges for state agencies include attracting younger workers into public service and the overall perception of government workers.

Walker has said the legislation he signed in February will help fill vacant state jobs and attract younger workers by shortening a hiring process that took months under the state's civil service system.

A big part of the change is eliminating the state's civil service exams in favor of a résumé-based system for evaluating applicants and deciding which of them get job interviews.

"This is really about bringing Wisconsin into the 21st century when it comes to recruitment and retention," Walker said in February.

Union officials like Badger have argued that the civil service changes could open up decisions on hiring, firing and compensation to more political influence. If that happens, it could also hurt the state's ability to attract good workers, he said.