Local Government Employees

Number of local government employees based on the Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communication's "Situation of Seats and Salaries of Local Government Organizations" for 2009. The total number of prefectural government employees, municipal school personnel and government-decreed city school personnel are compared. Although those working at partial-affairs associations that manage fire departments, waste disposal facilities and crematoriums across municipalities are also local government employees, because some organizations cover across more than one prefecture, they are not included in the number of local government employees. 3.38% of all local government employees (2,855,106) are partial-affairs association employees (96,256). National public employees (approximately 640,000) employed on a ministerial basis are also not included because they cannot be sorted on a prefectural level.

There are 2,855,106 local government employees in Japan, with 2.24 local government employees in every 100 population. This means that 2.24% of the population are local government employees. In the table below, the total number of local government employees is indicated as 2,758,681. This is the number of local government employees excluding partial-affairs association employees (96,425).

During the 15 year period from 1994 to 2009, the number of local government employees has decreased by 13%, from 3,280,000 to 2,860,000.

The breakdown of local government employees is as follows:

With respect to the education, police, firefighting and welfare sectors, the number of employees are, in most cases, specified under law, and it is difficult for local governments to change the number of personnel in these sectors. This means that the local government has the authority to change the number of personnel with respect to 33.5% of the sectors.

Compared to 2004, the number of personnel has decreased by 7% in the education sector and by 11% in the general administration sector. On the other hand, the number of personnel increased in the police and firefighting sectors. It can be seen that this past 5 years, the government has worked for financial reconstruction by reducing education and gerenal adminsitration services whil maintaining police and firefighting services.

Shimane has the greatest number of local government employees per 100 population, with 3.27 employees. Following Shimane are Kochi, Tottori, Tokushima and Iwate. Overall, there are many local government employees on the Japan Sea coast. There are more government employees in rural areas compared to urban areas. Because administrative divisions are affected by not only the population but also land features and land areas, it can be said that administrative management is more efficient in urban areas where there is dense population in small areas.

The correlative ranking shows high correation with Elementary Schools. The more elementary schools there are, the more government employees. This is because 37.7% of local government employees are school personnel. School districts are also affected by not only the population but also land features and land areas. In areas where there are many elementary schools in proportion to the population, there are believed to be situations making it physically difficult to eliminate or consolidate schools, such as dispersed settlements, and for the same reasons, it is believed difficult to improve efficiency in administrative services as well.

The number of local government employees is also positively correlated with the 2010 voter turnout for the House of Councillors' proportional representation election and the share of votes for the LDP in the 2010 House of Councillors' proportional representation election. There are more parliament seats and local government employees in areas with high voter turnout and votes for the LDP, indicating that areas that have been cooperative with the LDP under its long years of rule seem to have been treated more favorably in terms of the number of local government employees.