$100,000 Club: Number of Pa. state government's big-buck earners is on the rise

This bar chart shows the growth in the number of six-figure earners in Pennsylvania state government over the years.

After a one-year slump, the number of six-figure earners in Pennsylvania's state government rebounded in 2017 to its highest number ever, 8,290.

That represents a 714 increase in state government's $100,000 Club from 2016's 7,576 six-digit earners.

That was enough to drop the number of state government employees who made $100,000 or more from one in every 14 in 2016 to nearly one in every 13 workers last year.

In 2015, the number of employees earning six figures was 7,692.

Interestingly, Dan Egan, a spokesman for the governor's Office of Administration, noted the number of filled positions in executive agencies under the governor's jurisdiction has been cut by nearly 1,500 since December 2016, which brings the complement to the lowest level in more than four decades.

However, most of those agencies saw an increase in the number of six-figure earners, according to PennLive's analysis of earnings of the highest-compensated employees in the 106,422-member workforce in the three state governmental branches and independent state agencies.

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More than half of the 20 employees topping the earnings list are doctors who work for the state Department of Human Services with Dr. Michael Brogna being the highest earner in state government last year, with earnings that approached $413,000.

Brogna, a physician specialist in internal medicine at Danville State Hospital, has worked for the department for 26 years. He was the only state government employee who topped the $400,000 mark in 2017.

Keep in mind, earnings for the purposes of this report can reflect more than salary in some instances. It can include such forms of compensation as unused leave payout, overtime, bonuses, grievance awards, longevity payments, summer camps, summer school teaching assignments, and more.

Regardless of what form it takes, state government employees are compensated with public money that comes from a variety of sources, including tax dollars, fees, agency earnings, federal funds, fines, and more.

Here are some notable observations from an analysis of the earnings data:

  • It's always interesting to see where the governor - the highest elected state government official - lands in the rankings. Gov. Tom Wolf's pay, which he donates to charity, ranks 223
  • Nearly one in three state police employees - or 2, 073 - earned $100,000 or more last year.
  • The highest-paid elected official once again is state Supreme Court Chief Justice Tom Saylor, who earned $209,930 - the 102nd highest in all of state government.
  • The highest-paid legislative employee is not an elected official at all. It was the now-retired Senate Republican Appropriations Committee executive director Greg Jordan, who had earnings that totaled $245,598, making him the 51
  • The House had three more employees than it had in 2016 with six-figure earnings, for a total of 53, with the highest being House Republican chief counsel Anthony Aliano. The Senate had two fewer six-figure earnings than in the prior year, for a total of 71.
  • The State System of Higher Education had 139 more employees earning $100,000 or more in 2017 than they did the prior year. Its highest earner was Indiana University of Pennsylvania President Michael Driscoll, who made $315,399, the 12
  • The Department of Corrections, with its 749 $100,000 or more earners, also had 139 more employees earning six-figures in 2017 than it did in 2016.
  • For context, the average salary of state government employees under the governor's jurisdiction in 2017 was $55,449, according to the
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  • Considering that some of Pennsylvania state government's highest earners are CEOs, their pay is nothing compared to Pennsylvania's highest-paid corporate CEO, Comcast Corporation's Brian Roberts, who received almost $33 million in 2016, according to
  • Penn State, Pitt, Temple or Lincoln university employees are not included in the number of six-figure earners because they are not considered part of state government, but obviously they have six-figure,

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