Oregon state employees earned $4.4 billion last year. Search pay for all workers

Oregon state employees collectively earned $4.42 billion in the most recent fiscal year, an increase of roughly $500 million from the prior year.

Workers across state agencies saw larger paychecks in the 12-month period that ended this June, according to an analysis of state salary data by The Oregonian/OregonLive. In that time, the state employed 50,068 full-time workers and 1,809 part-time employees. That total headcount is about 1,000 higher than the year before.

Those workers range widely in job titles and salaries. They include park rangers, social workers, electricians, correctional officers and paralegals. As usual, the state’s highest earners were nearly all top administrators or physicians at the state psychiatric hospital or state Treasury executives who manage the state’s investments.

The median pay for full-time employees was $83,602, up from $75,471 in the previous fiscal year. More than a third of the state’s employees — 17,684 — earned more than $100,000, compared to fewer than 14,000 who earned six figures the year prior.

That median pay is likely lower than the true median for state employees, as the state’s dataset does not indicate if a person worked the full fiscal year or was hired partway through it. Also, the pay listed for workers who started new jobs or received pay bumps during the fiscal year likely does not reflect their true annual salary.

Several factors contributed to the rise in wages. State employees covered by collective bargaining agreements received 6.5% cost-of-living pay bumps in January, according to Bryanna Duke, a spokesperson for the Department of Administrative Services, while pay increases for non-represented employees were determined by each agency. Also, many employees received merit-based pay increases or higher salaries negotiated by public employee unions.

Many union-represented workers are slated to receive 2.5% cost-of-living increases in February next year and 4% bumps in January 2027.

The state’s true highest-paid employees are not included in the state’s dataset. That’s because public university employees — including well-paid coaches of major athletic programs — are state employees, but are omitted because public universities are considered independent agencies.

If the data included public university employees, University of Oregon football coach Dan Lanning would likely top the list of the state’s highest earners. Earlier this year, Lanning agreed to a new contract that would raise his average annual salary above $10 million through 2031, several news outlets have reported.

Meanwhile, Oregon’s elected officials brought in far less than the state’s top earners. Most state lawmakers earned $42,100 in base pay and additional pay ranging from $25,000 to $45,000 for stipends and untaxed per diem payments during legislative sessions to cover gas and other expenses. Gov. Tina Kotek earned $110,810, making her Oregon’s 13,416th highest paid employee among those included in the dataset.

The state’s highest paid employee, physician James Arash Peykanu, earned $374,063 in base pay and $422,176 in “other pay” for a total of $796,239. That figure represents an increase from his earnings in the previous fiscal year, when Peykanu earned about $720,000 as the state’s second highest earner.

Peykanu, a licensed psychiatrist, frequently works overnight, on-call shifts at the state hospital, contributing to his high level of extra pay, according to Amber Shoebridge, spokesperson for the state hospital.

Physicians on the state’s payroll can qualify for extra pay in several ways, including bonus pay for bilingual doctors who work with non-English speaking patients or for physicians with board certification specialties. Many doctors also receive a significant amount of bonus pay for on-call work at the state hospital, which requires them to be on-site.

The state’s second highest earner, mental health registered nurse Douye Inaibo, earned $183,971 in base pay, $157,590 in other pay and $427,029 in overtime pay, for a total of $768,590. No other state employee received close to that amount of overtime pay.

For years, nurses at the state hospital have reported working large amounts of overtime due to staff shortages and significant turnover in the high-stress workplace. In a two-month period last summer, nurses at the facility worked more than 2,500 hours of mandatory overtime, the Oregon Capital Chronicle reported at the time, leading to hundreds of union grievances alleging violations of labor laws.

Shoebridge said Inaibo’s high amount of overtime pay stemmed from her working “many extra shifts” amid staffing issues at the state hospital. She also received a “negotiated pay differential” for her level of education, plus another pay differential given to nurses who work outside of traditional working hours.

Rex Kim, the state’s chief investment officer who oversees the state’s massive public employee pension fund and other state funds, landed fourth on the list with a total pay of $655,193, including $75,947 in other pay. Kim was the highest state earner the prior fiscal year, when he earned a total of $810,030.

Certain Treasury administrators can receive incentive pay up to about 30% of their base salary based on performance evaluations and how well the funds overseen by the agency perform in a rolling five-year period, according to Treasury spokesperson Eric Engelson.

“Consistent with practices used by many large public pension systems nationwide, Treasury’s compensation structure is designed to attract and retain experienced investment professionals needed to manage the state’s pension fund and protect the retirement security of Oregon’s public employees,” Engelson said in an email.

In an analysis of state workers’ salaries conducted last year, the Department of Administrative Services found that Oregon’s average state employee compensation was competitive with private sector pay when including the state’s benefits and its 2025 cost-of-living pay increase.

For example, the state’s “generous medical plans” mean that a state employee would pay about $23 monthly on a health insurance plan for themselves and their family, while an average private sector worker would pay $545 a month for the same plan, per the report.

As usual, the state agencies that employ the most workers spent the most money on their payrolls. The largest state agency by number of employees, the Department of Human Services, employed about 12,100 workers during the fiscal year and spent $913,984,240 on employees’ paychecks. The Oregon Health Authority, the second largest agency, employed nearly 6,000 workers and spent $566,053,162 on its payroll.

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