Public sector jobs are created because governments opt to provide goods and services produced directly by public employees. Governments, however, may also choose to regulate the size of the public sector in order to stabilize targeted national employment levels. However, economic research...

This paper examines the public sector wage premium using nationally representative household surveys from 91 countries. The public sector generally pays a wage premium compared to all private sector salaried employees, but the size of the premium is sensitive to the choice of the private sector...