Vast federal job cuts being driven by President Donald Trump could benefit Hawaii state and county workforces burdened by high vacancies.
About 5,000 state civil service jobs, excluding public school teacher positions, were vacant as of Feb. 11, according to the state Department of Human Resources Development.
Elena Murayama, a DHRD spokesperson, said the state could use personnel separated from the federal workforce in Hawaii to fill vacancies and help maintain job stability for residents.
“The governor and DHRD are looking at ways to support our federally employed residents with opportunities in local government,” Murayama said in an email.
At the City and County of Honolulu, there were little more than 2,000 civil service vacancies as of Feb. 1, according to a spokesperson.
“If the opportunity presents itself, given our staffing challenges across the City, we intend to be very proactive in recruiting and conducting outreach to federal employees who are displaced by job cuts, or who are interested in seeking new government career opportunities,” Ian Scheuring, a city spokesperson, said in a statement.
Carl Bonham, director of the University of Hawaii Economic Research Organization, said the extent of a possible silver lining to federal job cuts in Hawaii could be constrained by several factors.
For one thing, anticipated cuts to federal funds received by state and county governments could have budget impacts that shrink the ability to fill empty local government positions.
“What happens in Washington is going to impact state budgets, and it’s not really at all clear that state or local governments are going to be in a position where they’re trying to add to their labor force when there’s going to be pressure on their budgets because of federal cutbacks,” Bonham said.
Gov. Josh Green already wants to reduce state job vacancies in part by eliminating positions that have been vacant for more than four years as a way to free up revenue in the state budget for other needs.
A second issue Bonham mentioned is pay differentials between federal and local government jobs. Federal jobs tend to pay more and often include cost-of-living adjustments.
“It’s not going to be a smooth transition (financially) into a state job or a local county job,” Bonham said.
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Average annual pay for federal jobs in Hawaii topped private sector, state and county jobs, according to the most recent data available from the state Department of Business, Economic Development and Tourism.
DBEDT reported that the average annual pay by the federal government in Hawaii in 2023 was $93,710. That compared with $61,894 for private businesses, $61,923 at the state and $80,399 for counties. For all employers, the average was $64,207.
Another limiting factor on displaced federal workers landing state or county jobs is whether the skills of displaced workers align with available jobs.
Scheuring said it is challenging to predict how specific federal job classes or occupations impacted by job cuts could align with city needs.
“We believe that some job classifications — administrative and clerical workers, engineers of various specialties, and trades workers like electricians and plumbers — have the potential to overlap with some of our needs,” he said.
The city’s biggest need is at the Honolulu Police Department, where there is a need to hire 206 recruits.
The next highest vacancy level at the city is office assistant positions, where there are 119 vacancies. The city also wants to hire 74 civil engineers, 62 planners, 54 groundskeepers, 47 police communications officers, 34 heavy truck drivers, 34 job resource specialists and smaller numbers for many more positions.
Murayama at DHRD said the state always has a need for employees in fields of information technology, human resources, law enforcement, accounting, building custodians, clerical support, registered nurses, clinical psychologists, social workers, investigators, environmental health specialists and general laborers.
The highest vacancy levels by state agency are at the Department of Health with 765 vacancies, followed by the Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation with 680 vacancies, the Department of Human Services with 583 vacancies and the Department of Transportation with 559 vacancies.
Filling state and county jobs with qualified candidates has been challenging in part due to relatively low unemployment in Hawaii. In December, the state’s seasonally adjusted unemployment rate was 3%, up a tick from 2.9% over the proceeding six consecutive months, according to DBEDT.
The 3% figure represented 19,850 unemployed people in the local workforce employing 652,900 people.
There are about 35,500 federal civilian workers in Hawaii, according to DBEDT.
It’s uncertain how many federal jobs will end up being cut under Trump’s initiative to dramatically reduce the size of the federal government.
One part of the president’s plan includes permitting agency leaders to replace no more than one employee for every four departed employees, which could limit how many federal workers end up landing jobs elsewhere.
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Hawaii Government workforce
Number of employees in December:
State — 71,800
Federal — 35,500
Counties — 19,400
Total — 126,700
Source: State Department of Business, Economic Development and Tourism
Job openings
As of Feb. 11, state and county vacancies need to fill:
State civil service — 5,000
City and County civil service — 2,000
