Reykjavik city staffing grows 26% in a decade

Reykjavik City employs 11.3% of its working-age residents, while the number of city positions has risen by more than 26% in ten years, according to figures cited by Morgunblaðið.

Mid-Center Party city council member Ari Edwald said it was notable that the share of working-age people employed by the city was higher than in neighbouring municipalities. He said the rise in staffing levels over recent years also warranted scrutiny.

The city has about 11,000 employees, while 97,375 residents are aged 18 to 70, the figures used in the report show. The calculation does not account for unemployed people or those outside the labour market. The national unemployment rate was 7.3% in January, according to the article.

At the end of last year, Reykjavik City’s A-part municipal fund had 8,675 full-time equivalent positions. Edwald said that was an increase of more than 1,800, or over 26%, in ten years. During the same period, the city’s population grew by 14%, from about 122,000 in 2015 to nearly 139,000 in 2025. The A-part figure covers city employees but excludes staff at companies owned by the city.

Edwald also referred to plans to cut 130 positions, a larger change than the workplace usually sees, but equivalent to about 1.5% of positions in the A-part. The share of wage costs attributed to central administration is expected to fall from 8.4%, as estimated over the summer, to 7.5%, he said. He added that these changes were smaller than those faced by people working in the private sector.