The Worker Institute and the Buffalo Co-Lab Present Research at the New York State Association of Black, Puerto Rican, Hispanic & Asian Legislators, Inc. 54th Legislative Conference

On February 15, 2025 the Worker Institute and the Buffalo-Co-Lab joined a panel discussion with New York State Senator Robert Jackson, Commissioner of New York State Civil Service, Timothy Hogues, and Vice President of the Public Employees Federation, Randi DiAntonio, at the New York State Association of Black, Puerto Rican, Hispanic & Asian Legislators, Inc. 54th Legislative Conference. The panel, entitled Declining Public Employment in Mental Health and the Disproportionate Impact on Women and Workers of Color, started with a presentation of findings from Russell Weaver, Research Director at the Buffalo Co-Lab and Anne Marie Brady, Research Director, Worker Rights and Equity, at the Worker Institute. They presented on findings from a study they conducted that explored the impact austerity measures and the privatization of New York State mental health services has had on the employment and wages of the public sector mental health workforce from 1990 to 2021.

Their analysis showed that despite overall employment growth in mental health-related industries between 2000 and 2020, the number of mental health workers employed by the New York State government had fallen by roughly 10%. The groups most impacted by this change were Black or African American New Yorkers who were more likely to fall out of the public sector mental health workforce than workers from any other Census Bureau-tracked racial-ethnic group. Reflecting intersectionalities, contraction of the state government mental health workforce has negatively impacted more women than men; however, African American men experienced the largest relative drop in state government mental health job numbers.

At the same time public sector contraction of mental health-related jobs disproportionately affected Black or African American workers, private sector job growth in these industries was driven by this group. The number of Black or African American workers in private sector mental health-related industries increased by 25.1% between 2000 and 2020, compared to a 19.3% increase for white workers. Meanwhile, fueled by the heavy, racially uneven job loss that occurred since 2010, racial diversity in the state government mental health workforce has begun to tick downward. But for those working in the private sector, their earnings, the analysis found, is on average lower than in the public sector. The median annual salary of a full-time worker in a mental health-related industry was over $1,700 greater for a state government employee compared to their private sector counterpart. These wage differentials were even higher ($5,000 on average) for traditionally working-class jobs like personal care aids, cleaners or building maintenance.

The researchers then discussed the significance of the findings. That Black and African American public sector workers in mental health experienced the greatest effects of this structural change is significant because of the important role the public sector has historically played for African American social and economic mobility. The public sector’s more regulated wage system, its commitment to equal opportunity policies and its bureaucratic hiring and promotion practices have protected women and African American workers from gender and race-based economic discrimination in pay and/or occupational attainment. Since Reconstruction, the public sector has been an important vehicle for mobility in ways the private sector has not.

Patricia Campos-Medina, Executive Director of the Worker Institute, moderated the panel discussion. She invited Senator Jackson, Commissioner Hogues and VP DiAntonio to respond to the findings, given their positions as legislators, civil servants and union representatives. Sen. Jackson who chairs the Civil Service and Pension Committee and is a member of the Health Committee, pointed to the need to increase funding in mental health services while Commissioner Hogues spoke about how his Department is working to make public service more accessible to a wider range of applicants, including ways they are working to diversity the workforce to make it more equitable. Vice President DiAntonio of PEF—the New York State union that represents public sector workers—stressed the importance of increasing funding for mental health, but in so doing, making sure that those funds were supporting public sector services (and thereby public sector workers) and not underwriting contracts to private sector providers. She also stressed that while wages were higher in the public sector than the private sector, more needed to be done to increase wages to cover the high costs of living that everyone was experiencing. She stressed that without reinvestment into—and meaningful job (re-)creation within—the New York State public mental health workforce, observable trends will continue to exacerbate patterns of racial, gender, and economic inequality in New York State.