SAINT JOHN (NB):The Canadian Taxpayers Federation (CTF)  has obtained Statistics Canada data on the most serious labour issue in Canada – the growing gap between the pay, pensions and benefits of government employees and what everybody else is getting. 

In the last ten years, the wage gap between government and private sector workers in New Brunswick grew faster than in any other province and three times the national average.

Public sector salaries in New Brunswick grew 14.3 per cent faster than private sector salaries from July 2001 to July 2011. In the same period of time public sector salaries in the rest of Canada grew by just 5.4 per cent.

Salaries

                                    2001                           2011

Public Sector              $645.80                      $933.96

Private Sector            $497.62                      $648.17

Note: Figures are for the month of July.

“Massive pay increases for government workers means less money to help our children in school, provide front line health services or tax relief to families struggling to get by,” says Kevin Lacey, Atlantic Director for the Canadian Taxpayers Federation.

Along with the salaries, a greater number of New Brunswick government employees are also receiving gold-plated perks like defined benefit pension plans.

The most recent numbers on pensions in 2009, showed that 83.6 per cent government employees had a pension plan while just 24.9 per cent in the private sector had them.

 “As baby boomers get older, there are now two classes of citizens, those with expensive government pensions who can retire easily and those who are on the hook to cover the government pension shortfalls, most of whom have no pension at all,” adds Lacey.

In 2010, the New Brunswick Auditor General predicted the total public sector pension expense would be $321 million.

You can find a link to the Statistics Canada data HERE