SEC Slow to Fill Job Openings, GAO Finds

Fewer than half of the job openings at the Securities and Exchange Commission were filled during the six months ending in March amid competition from private industry for lawyers and accountants, according to a new government report.

The agency filled 42% of the 782 positions open as of Sept. 30, leaving 454 still vacant, according to the Government Accountability Office. Most jobs were in the areas of enforcement, examinations and financial disclosure.

The “SEC faces ongoing challenges filling many of the newly created positions, particularly accountants, due to competition from the private sector,” the GAO said.

Accounting scandals at Enron Corp. and WorldCom Inc. led to the Sarbanes-Oxley Act’s stricter standards on corporate disclosure and demands for greater scrutiny by regulators. Congress increased the SEC’s budget by more than $300 million from 2002 to 2004, and the agency’s proposed budget for fiscal year 2005 is $913 million, a 10% increase.

Peter Derby, an SEC managing director, said the report failed to reflect a spate of hiring since March: “Between mid-April and mid-July, we’ve done a significant amount of hiring,” Derby said.