Public workers in the Greater Accra Region are paid more than their counterparts in other regions.
This was revealed in a document titled Ghana 2022 Ghana Statistical Service (GSS) dubbed Ghana 2022 earnings: Inequality in the public sector.
While some public sector workers earn an average monthly net salary of GH3,142, others in the North East Region earn around GH2,212, according to the GSS.
“Greater Accra has the highest average monthly net salary (GH₵3,142) with North East recording the lowest (GH₵2,212),” GSS said in the report.
According to the GSS report, men earn a higher average monthly net salary of GH2,669 than women, who earn GH2,504.
“The difference between the average net salary of men and women is GH₵165. This means that the gender pay gap is 6.0 percent. Men have a higher average monthly net salary, of GH₵2,669, while women have an average of GH₵2,504. The average monthly net salary of women is lower than that of men in all 16 regions,” the report stated.
According to GSS, the average monthly salary for employees over the age of 60 is significantly higher than for any other age group.
“The average monthly salary for employees older than 60 years (GH₵14,466) is much higher than that of any other age group, almost five (4.7) times the average of 51 to 60 years, the group with the next highest average. For the age groups up to 41 to 50 years, the average monthly net salary increases by between GH₵300 and GH₵500 from one age group to the next, with an increase of around GH₵200 between 41 to 50 years and 51 to 60 years.,” GSS noted.
According to the report, “the average monthly net salary of public sector employees is GH₵2,594. The highest-paid earner takes home GH₵33,855, which is close to 81 times as high as the net salary of the lowest-paid worker (GH₵418). The top 10 percent of the employees with the highest net salaries earn 22 percent of the total net salary. Half of the employees earn only one-third of the total net salary.”
Per the GSS report, the government of Ghana employs approximately 688,000 people, with Ashanti (18.2%) and Greater Accra (16.5%) accounting for more than one-third (34.8%) of the workforce.
The North East (1.4%) and Savannah (1.4%) regions account for only 2.8 percent of all public sector employees.
Professor Samuel Anim, a government statistician, stated that much work may be required to bridge the gap.
Professor Anim, speaking at the launch of a survey on the salary structure of public sector workers, bemoaned the structure’s many inequalities.
“Take every five government employees, four out of that five are earning less than GH¢3,000. It’s important that as a country we should assess our situation. The worrying part is that inequality is more profound in the world”.
“The danger with that is if inheritance kicks in, it means that inequality will be transferred from one generation to another generation,” the Government Statistician noted.
