Sep. 30—With all this talk of surpluses, tax cuts and where money should go, we'd like to draw attention to another of West Virginia's chronically underfunded services: state jobs.

In mid-September, analysts presented the results of a state audit to the Legislature's Post Audits Committee. The revelation of the day was that millions of dollars are allocated annually for vacant positions, some of which have been empty for years. As of December 2021, there were 4, 857 vacant positions that had been budgeted for, totaling about $227 million of allocated but theoretically unspent state money.

As committee members asked questions, it was clarified that at least some of the money budgeted for these vacant positions has been used to pay overtime for other employees or to hire temporary or contract workers. That makes perfect sense. After all, the work still has to get done. In the absence of dedicated personnel, it's only logical that other employees would have to pick up the slack—resulting in overtime—or temporary workers would have to be hired to handle pressing needs.

Legislators implied that, at best, the way the allocated dollars were being spent wasn't accurately reflected in the budget or, at worst, the budget has been artificially inflated.

While the former might be true, the latter certainly isn't. If anything, the budget for those vacant position has been grossly underestimated—hence why the positions are still unfilled.

The Division of Health and the Division of Human Services have two of the greatest number of vacancies at 800 and 600, respectively. These are the kinds of jobs that require at least a bachelor's degree, but more likely a master's or a doctorate.

If the state wants to fill those jobs, they need to be financially worthwhile to qualified applicants, and by the analysts' own admission, they aren't—which is why the jobs are still vacant.

If you take the budget for all vacant positions and divide it by the number of positions, you're looking at approximately $46, 000 per job in salary and benefits (slightly under the state's median income), assuming that each job will pay roughly the same. (It will vary: A current Department of Health and Human Resources listing for an epidemiologist starts at $60, 000, but a social worker starts at $39, 000.) Then consider the student debt applicants with degrees bring with them.

The average master's degree holder comes out of school with over $70, 000 in total student loan debt, according to the most recent statistics available. Someone with a Ph.D. will have approximately $117, 000 in debt. Please note: Those figures are from 2016, so the amounts are likely even higher now.

Bear with us for a little more math. Working on our assumption that each of the vacant positions pays $46, 000 a year, we're going to generously assume employees make around $3, 800 a month (this is without any tax withholding). Someone with a master's degree should pay around $730 per month toward student loans ; with a Ph.D, $1, 222 per month.

With one-fourth to one-third of every paycheck going towards paying for the education that let them qualify for the job—never mind taxes and the cost of housing, groceries, medical care and other daily necessities—is it any wonder state jobs remain vacant for so long ?

The best way to fix the problem is to increase the budget—not decrease it—so each job can pay qualified candidates an appropriate wage.