The report, discussed by the outgoing government on Wednesday in its last correspondence session, shows that the gross pay bill of direct budget beneficiaries was up 4.4% or about EUR 40m to EUR 957m, and 5.3% or EUR 140m to EUR 2.8bn in indirect beneficiaries.
Moreover, the number of man hours performed in the public sector went up by 3,717 to 166,355 in 2017.
The figure also increased due to promotions, which had been frozen for years until late 2016 because of austerity, and due to a wage increase for those in lower pay brackets.
Performance bonuses accounted for more than 2% of the public sector wage bill last year, up 6.6% or EUR 5.2m.
Other bonuses amounted to a total of EUR 305m, up 3.6% or EUR 10.7m over 2016, with the years of service bonus accounting for nearly 57% of the total figure.
An additional comparison between 1994 and 2017 shows that the public sector pay went up 41.4% in real terms, while the private sector pay increased by 54.2% in real terms during the same period.
