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Government Jobs Not Rebounding As In Past Recessions

December 14, 2012 11:00 am / Leave a comment

The graph below depicts the rebound in government jobs over the past four recessions.  This time it is different.  Government jobs aren’t returning.  The present financial crisis and austerity budgets at the state level have given governors the green light to radically reduce public sector employment levels in unprecedented ways.  This not only hurts our economy, it damages the ability of state and local governments to serve the needs of its citizens.
 In a prior post I presented original data on state employment data showing the national trend in state austerity budgets.  The private sector job growth has already rebounded to pre-recession levels, but has not caught up to where it should be by now. In contrast, government austerity budgets are keeping public sector employment depressed and below pre-recession levels.  The graph above and the following article add to this information. State governors should be helping to lead us out of this recession and at the least preserving jobs.]

Public-sector austerity in one graph

Posted by  at 03:35 PM ET, 06/11/2012

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.