Conventionally, Connecticut governors negotiate omnibus wage contracts for state employees with the State Employee Bargaining Alliance Coalition (SEBAC), an umbrella group comprised of over 30 union bargaining units representing most state employees. Not Ned Lamont, not this year.
Most of the state’s nearly 50,000 employees have been working without a wage contract since the last omnibus, so-called SEBAC 2022, expired last June. Until this week, Lamont had struck deals with only the state police (not members of SEBAC) and three small “law and order” SEBAC units, which the General Assembly approved without much notice.
Now, Lamont has submitted a larger contract covering about 4,000 Service and Maintenance employees (bargaining unit “NP-2”) for a vote in the General Assembly this week. Yesterday, the House approved it; today, the Senate votes. That will leave over 40,000 employees still awaiting a new contract. Why the piecemeal approach?
Likely, because he is awarding another string of 4.5% annual wage increases, which, together with the preceding two 5.5% and four 4.5% annual increases, would elevate wages about 60% over the decade following Lamont’s first inauguration.
If Lamont were to award 60% to all state employees at the same time, surely that would generate prominent – and unflattering – media attention and general alarm. Already the aggregate payroll has surged from $4.6 billion to more than $6.0 billion under Lamont. The new contract with four more 4.5% annual increases, if extended to all employees would translate into another $1.3 billion increase, taking the payroll to the eye-watering height of $7.3 billion.
Already, the average state salary has risen from about $70,000 to about $95,000 under Lamont. A new contract with four 4.5% annual increases would increase the average to about $113,000.
Not only is Lamont proceeding piecemeal, but he is sequencing the pieces strategically. He knows that Republicans are strong advocates of law and order and predisposed to vote to support the police. It is more than GOP affinity for these groups (and vice versa). The raises for the state police and related units also solve a problem of Lamont’s own making, as he and the Democrats have damaged staff retention and recruiting in these units with their anti-police ideology and action. Witness the Democrat’s police accountability act. Higher wages certainly help with this problem, both genuinely and politically for Lamont.
Now, the NP-2 contract is designed to exploit the normal human impulse of greater sympathy for low-wage workers. The 4,000 NP-2 workers are among the lowest paid employees on the state payroll with an average salary somewhere between about $55,000 and $60,000, according to the OpenPayroll database maintained by the State Comptroller – and depending upon headcount.
For FY2025, OpenPayroll shows about 4,000 NP-2 workers; yet the official cost estimate for the new NP-2 contract provided to General Assembly members cites slightly less than 3,700.
The cost estimate reveals additional information that is not just windage or squirrelly detail or inevitable differences in calculation approaches. First, a brief explanation of “step increases.” Over their careers, state employees advance up steps, until senior workers reach the top of the stairs.
Those at the top of the stairs who have no more steps receive a “lump sum” in lieu of a step increase in new wage contracts. The assumption is that the “lumps” are the rough equivalent of steps, right? Not in this year’s NP-2 contract. The cost estimate states “a lump sum equal to 2.5% of salary,” a notch above the 2.0% average of “steps.”
Note, those at the “top of the stairs” are, by definition, the highest paid workers. They represent about 20% of the NP-2 workforce. They will get a string of 5.0% annual increases.
Another feature of the NP-2 contract is “grade changes” for 14 job titles with resulting pay increases. These job titles include 30% of the NP-2 workforce and about 25% of the payroll. Yet the cost estimate includes no reasons for the changes.
Despite that this contract is even more generous than the preceding omnibus, SEBAC 2022, several House Republicans voted “yes” yesterday (as, of course, did all Democrats). The word from inside the House chamber was that some Republicans explained their “yes” votes with words such as “being for the regular guy fixing our roads.”
Yet the question is why should that regular guy in Connecticut be paid more than his counterpart in neighboring Massachusetts, Rhode Island or New York? It is almost certain that they are paid more than their nearby peers, since average state wages in Connecticut are higher than average state wages in those states. The average, in 2023, in Connecticut was about $83,000 versus about $75,000 in New York, according to the OpenPayrolls website that tracks publicly available wage information nationwide.
The real takeaway is that being lowest paid, in and of itself, doesn’t justify exorbitant pay raises for NP-2 tier or any other bargaining group.
This afternoon, the Connecticut Senate should vote down the NP-2 contract. In anticipation of upcoming contracts, citizens should contact the governor and all their representatives in Hartford and call for a state employee wage freeze.
Red Jahncke is a nationally recognized columnist, who writes about politics and policy. His columns appear in numerous national publications, such as The Wall Street Journal, Bloomberg, USA Today, The Hill, Issues & Insights and National Review as well as many Connecticut newspapers.