New Mexico State Jobs Hiring Freeze Saves Money
Efforts to curb hiring employees for New Mexico state jobs has saved the state a considerable amount of money.
Gov. Bill Richardson recently announced that the hiring freeze and other cost saving measures he implemented during 2008 have saved the State of New Mexico millions of dollars in payroll costs. Biweekly state payroll alone has decreased by $1.3 million since November 2008, when the initiatives were implemented.
"I am disturbed that some lawmakers have seriously mischaracterized the results of these important cost cutting measures," Richardson said. "The truth is, there have been real results and savings to the State of New Mexico. In just the past 11 months, we’ve cut payroll by millions while making sure services to New Mexicans are not affected."
New Mexico currently has 1,300 fewer employees than when the hiring freeze took effect. Other cost cutting measures implemented by Richardson through June 2010 include:
- freezing salaries of all employees
- 2 percent pay cut to all employees effective March 2009
- no exempt comp time
- no overtime for non-essential employees
- no exempt buyout of unused annual leave
- freezing upward reclassification
New Mexico's government industry as a whole has been doing relatively well despite the state cost cutting efforts. The industry had a total non-farm employment of 199,400 workers during September, according to the U.S. Department of Labor Bureau of Labor Statistics. This is up from 198,100 workers during August and a .6 percent increase from last year.
And even though New Mexico's overall unemployment rate increased last month, the state managed to add some jobs on a monthly basis. During September, the state saw its unemployment rate increase from 7.4 percent to 7.7 percent, which is lower than the national unemployment rate of 9.8 percent.
The state had a total non-farm employment of 817,700 workers during September, which is up from 814,000 workers during August, but a 3.8 percent decrease from last year.