After graduating in 2000, I worked in pte sector for 1-2 years before moving to ministry when the dot-com burst.

Generally speaking, starting salaries are higher in public sector than pte. Most recent fresh IT grad I know of, started around $3.2K (with NS) in public sector compared to ~$2.1 - 2.8K in pte. That's because only local IT firms like NCS & Frontline are willing to take in fresh grads and these local companies are known to be "stingy".

Fast-forward 5-8 years, the whole picture changes. Head-hunters started calling with their clients willing to pay. Generally speaking (exception do applies), they would look out for those in pte sector, as their exp are more relevant compared to their public sector peers who only knows how to call government tenders, minutes-taking & policies writing (i.e. paper-work & red-tape in general)!

Of course, there are some exceptions. I do know of some small no. of hard-working operational public sectors workers are generally sought after (but they have to be really on operational IT with solid technical knowledge). As general, most IT folks I met are not really technical, even though they might be good at writing policies and theories.