Pasadena, CA -- (SBWIRE) -- 07/01/2011 -- Dannel Malloy of Connecticut is planning to cut over 5,000 jobs and leave another 1,000 jobs vacant in a bid to close the budget deficit.

Malloy says that 5,466 state employees need to be laid off in order to close a $1.6 billion budget deficit. One of the reasons for the cuts is that Moody's Investors Service has downgraded Connecticut's ratings from stable to negative. The decision was based on the fact that Connecticut has some of America's most underfunded pension plans.

Efforts to close the deficit by other ways are not getting a lot of success. The labor unions rejected a deal that would have resulted in a 2 year wage freeze and 9 unpaid furlough days. The state employees would also have to pay more in their healthcare contributions.

Across the board cuts are a possibility only if the departments involved cannot find ways to save money in other ways. The biggest hit is going to be for the corrections department which will lose 1,019 positions. Other departments that will be losing many positions are the department of transportation with 817 cuts. The judicial department will have 450 job cuts and 403 jobs will be cut in the state's universities and community colleges.

State and city governments nationwide are on a job reduction mode. Most of the new few government jobs that are being created are actually in the federal government.

GovernmentCrossing, a job aggregator site, for jobs from various government organizations, has located over 25,000 jobs at all levels of government.