Workforce trends.

• Position: Brief article

More than half of state and local governments still have pay freezes and are adjusting retirement and health-care benefits. At the same time, the pace of layoffs has slowed, with 28 percent reporting layoffs this year, compared with 40 percent last year, according to State and Local Government Workforce: Trends 2012. The top workforce issue cited is the public perception of government workers.

Issues that continue to rank as most important are retaining staff for core services, addressing employee morale and workload problems, staff development, and reducing employee health-care costs.

Workforce changes include:

* Employees accelerating their plans for retirement (cited by 22 percent of respondents).

* Workforce shrinking since the 2008 economic downturn (68 percent).

* Pay freezes (51 percent).

* Hiring freezes (42 percent).

* Layoffs (28 percent).

* Health-care strategies including shifting more health-care costs to employees (51 percent, down from 72 percent last year), shifting more health-care costs to retirees (11 percent, down from 23 percent), and creating wellness programs (26 percent, down from 33 percent).

* Pension strategies...