Creative Loafing recently did a story about number of employees per 100,000 people in several Southern cities. It got me wondering how does Pensacola stack up – but since Pensacola only has an estimated population of 55,033, I reduced the stat down to number of employees per 1000 residents.
Atlanta 18.22 city employees per 1000
Tampa 13.63 per 1000
Charlotte 10.80 per 1000
Miami 0.966 per 1000
Pensacola (1,001 employees) 18.18 per 1000
I guess it could be argued that larger cities have greater economies of scale.
Just in case you wanted to know how Escambia County stacks with its population of 298,879 and 3,343 employees: 11.19 per 1000
If we combined the city and county employees (4,344):Â 14.53 per 1000 residents
Now you might see why I believe consolidation and/or annexation is needed.