June 16, 2017
The Iran Productivity Association complained last week that there is one civil servant for every 26 to 28 people in Iran, whereas the international average is one for every 600 to 800 people.
The group may be exaggerating; the US federal government employs 838,000 civilians, which is one civil servant for every 390 Americans—and that doesn’t include state and local government employees.
Still, the Iranian numbers are stark. And the huge number of government employees has become a recurrent subject of discussion among officials and others these days.
“The surplus workforce [in state bodies] is consuming 90 percent of the current budget, leaving no breathing room for other activities,” said Majlis Speaker Ali Larijani last year.
Oil Minister Bijan Namdar-Zanganeh has also complained of 100,000 unneeded employees in the ministry under his watch, saying they were all added during the eight-year tenure of President Mahmud Ahmadi-nejad, the daily Shahrvand reported.
Last month, the Ministries of Energy and Education said they have 25,700 and 50,000 excess staff respectively. Every now and then, other ministries and governmental organizations speak of the same problem.
Presidential advisor Mohammad-Ali Najafi said 40 percent of the workforce employed in Iranian governmental bodies are either redundant or incompetent. “This lowers productivity. The nepotistic hiring of under-motivated staff has deteriorated conditions in state organizations,” he said.
“The Fifth Five-Year Development Plan (2011-16) stipulated that a third of Iran’s economic growth was to be derived from growth in productivity. Yet, inept management over governmental organizations’ workforce prevented us from achieving that goal,” he said.
The problem, according to Majlis Deputy Abdolreza Azizi, stems from Iranians’ inherent and old school desire to be employed by the government, chiefly for job security and the pension benefit.
Economist Mehdi Pazouki says hiring civil servants is often based on nepotism rather than competence. “Therefore, governmental bodies are increasingly struggling with lack of a knowledgeable and efficient workforce. There has been a visible ineptitude,” he said.
“Competent graduates of Iran’s best universities are reluctant to work for the government as they see high positions held by inept people and don’t wish to subject themselves to unfair treatment. They prefer to work in the private sector instead.”