St. Louis County Accounts for One-Quarter of State Payroll Increase
most recent U.S. Census Bureau data. Total payroll figures for Missouri totaled $79.15
billion in 2004.
St. Louis County accounted for nearly one quarter of that increase, with $882.4 million in added payroll wages. This, along with a decrease of over 3,000 in paid employees in the county over the same period, indicates an increase in higher-skilled, higher-paying jobs.
Payroll is defined as the sum of all financial records of salaries, wages, bonuses, and deductions.
Missouri’s Counties
St. Louis County’s increase was higher than any
county in the state, and higher than the increase for the entire
state of Nebraska by $292 million. The total county payroll for
the time period was $22.1 billion; Nebraska’s was $23.7 billion.
St. Louis City had the second highest increase in the state, with $514 million more in payroll wages from 2003-04.
Other counties with significant payroll increases were Jackson, St. Charles, Greene, Platte and Clay. Counties with the largest decreases were Cape Girardeau, Dunklin, New Madrid and Barton, all of which experienced a decrease of at least $10 million in payroll wages.
|
Payroll Wages (County) |
|||
|
County |
2004 Annual Payroll ($1,000s) |
2003-2004 Change ($1000s) |
Percent Change |
|
St. Louis |
22,163,768 |
882,466 |
4.1 |
|
St. Louis City |
11,068,132 |
514,370 |
4.9 |
|
Jackson |
12,993,422 |
405,797 |
3.2 |
|
St. Charles |
3,717,872 |
381,671 |
11.4 |
|
Greene |
3,915,613 |
214,496 |
5.8 |
|
Platte |
1,262,243 |
151,099 |
13.6 |
|
Clay |
3,081,558 |
149,361 |
5.1 |
|
Barton |
103,590 |
-10,081 |
-8.9 |
|
New Madrid |
126,180 |
-11,258 |
-8.2 |
|
Dunklin |
158,403 |
-11,889 |
-7.0 |
|
Cape Girardeau |
1,005,538 |
-18,211 |
-1.8 |
The largest percentage increases among
Missouri counties occurred in Caldwell (19.3), Daviess (15.4),
Johnson (15.2) and Reynolds (14.3). Counties experiencing the
greatest percentage decreases were Grundy (-14.8), Schulyer
(-10.6), Atchison (-10.2), Barton (-8.9) and New Madrid (-8.2).
Missouri’s Neighbors
In Missouri as a whole, payroll wages
increased 4.7 percent from 2003 through 2004, just below the
national average of 5.3 percent. Missouri topped three of its
border states in its percentage increase — Illinois, Iowa and
Nebraska.
| Payroll Wages (Border States) | |||
| State | 2004 Annual Payroll ($1000s) | 2003-2004 Change ($1000s) | Percent Change |
| Oklahoma | 35,597,604 | 2,042,248 | 6.1 |
| Arkansas | 28,670,925 | 1,635,603 | 6 |
| Kentucky | 46,163,189 | 2,395,057 | 5.5 |
| Tennessee | 76,922,192 | 3,718,554 | 5.1 |
| Kansas | 35,725,813 | 1,684,867 | 4.9 |
| Missouri | 79,157,172 | 3,562,241 | 4.7 |
| Iowa | 37,643,817 | 1,654,586 | 4.6 |
| Illinois | 207,884,485 | 6,844,194 | 3.4 |
| Nebraska | 23,681,558 | 589,578 | 2.6 |
Missouri’s actual payroll wages increased by $3.6 billion from 2003 to 2004. Only Illinois, at $6.8 billion and Tennessee, at $3.7 billion, had a higher payroll wage increase during this span. And only Illinois had higher total payroll wages in 2004 among border states.
Report by Michael Muin, map by Melissa Lanclos
