Public-sector austerity in one graph
On Friday, I ran some numbers on public-sector employment: Since Obama was elected, the public sector has lost about 600,000 jobs. If you put those jobs back, the unemployment rate would be 7.8 percent. [SNIP]
Today, Ben Polak, chairman of the economics department at Yale University, and Peter K. Schott, professor of economics at the Yale School of Management, widen the lens, with similar results: There is something historically different about this recession and its aftermath: in the past, local government employment has been almost recession-proof. This time it’s not. [SNIP] Go to like to read the rest of Ezra Klein’s article. Thank you.