Public Sector Losing Jobs At Same Rate Private Sector Adding Them

When it comes to an economy trying to right itself, if it's not one thing, it's another.

Even as the economy seems to be moving -- slowly -- in the direction of growth, government jobs are disappearing at a steady pace, raising concerns that vital services will remain understaffed and delay a broader recovery.

The news from the private sector is good -- relatively speaking. A report released Wednesday showed that there were 110,000 new private-sector jobs added in October, beating expectations, and 116,000 new jobs in September. These aren't boom-economy numbers, according to Reuters, but they're mildly encouraging. Meanwhile, the number of claims filed for unemployment benefits dropped off last week, another cause for measured optimism.

But over in the public sector, the news is bad, and has been for a long time.

State and local government jobs have declined by more than 3 percent since August 2008, according to a recent blog post at the U.S. Department of Commerce Web site. That's about 646,000 jobs that have disappeared.

Over a third of those have happened in 2011 alone. In fact, the public sector has shed jobs this year at the same rate the private sector has added them -- 234,000 jobs lost in state and local government, a decline of 1.2 percent, versus 1.3 million new jobs in the private sector, a gain of 1.2 percent.

Mark Doms, chief economist at the Department of Commerce, wrote on the DoC Web site this week that among the jobs lost or at risk of disappearing in the wave of state and local government cuts are police officers, firefighters and public school teachers.

Downsizing is also taking place at the federal level, as agencies struggle to cut costs and get by on less tax revenue than in previous years. There are 30,000 fewer federal employees today than a year ago, according to the Associated Press.

Further federal job loss is likely to come. The 12-member congressional supercommittee, created in the wake of this summer's debt-ceiling standoff, has until Thanksgiving to deliver its recommendations for reducing government spending by $1.2 trillion.

Budget cuts expected at a number of departments, including the Postal Service, the Internal Revenue Service and the intelligence community, could translate into substantial layoffs throughout D.C., according to outplacement company Challenger, Gray & Christmas.

And that would hold only help to keep the nation's unemployment rate -- currently at 9.1 percent, with new estimates arriving Friday from the Bureau of Labor Statistics -- high.

Comments

[corte33]

12:45 PM on 11/08/2011

Typo again: "to influence others".

[corte33]

12:44 PM on 11/08/2011

I just read another piece that claims Obama is adding federal jobs. I doubt Obama is adding jobs. I hear that K Street has an outplacement service for ex-Congressmen who want to become lobbyists.
Requirements are few: high school diploma or equivalent, big mouth, and ability of influence others. (Sorry, Dale Carnegie.)

[zyxwvutsrqpo]

09:57 PM on 11/05/2011

In articles like these they always state the number of jobs--not the quality. For all we know Wal-mart just opened up a new chain of stores. More jobs we DON'T need...

[Rick4646]

11:58 AM on 11/05/2011

It's amazing that over 2 million private sector jobs were created since 2008. We can even add more private sector jobs if the GOP will quit laying off and hire back teachers, cops, and firefighters....Oh, but that would mean more people will have jobs and the economy would get better, and yes deficits will decrease with more people working ( even public sector jobs ); what was I thinking that the GOP would want to do that.

[mistykane]

10:37 AM on 11/06/2011

Each public sector employee costs the private sector 7 jobs. That's how much revenue comes out of the private sector to pay for the employee's pay and benefits. It's the high unemployment in the private sector that resulted in public sector lay offs - because of the loss of tax revenue.
Clinton eliminated 250,000 public sector jobs in order to balance the budget. He knew that the more govt cost, less would be available for the private sector which is the sector that creates jobs.

[Ginny Fischer]

07:21 PM on 11/08/2011

Source?

[Drew Puli Wolf]

08:43 PM on 11/04/2011

For all you republicans cheering the lost of Public Sector jobs; maybe we should have a public services like they do in Mexico or some other third world country. Pay you Police little or nothing they can make it up by taking bribes, extortion or other criminal activities. Why do we need to pay health inspector ;so what if you not sure it the restaurant your eating in got the A rating because it was clean or the owner paid a bribe. The office building I work in is it safe? Did it pass the inspection or did the builder give a bribe. In fact turn government totally private with all the workers as independent contracts need something done – not quite legal (toxic waste dump in a residential neighborhood – approved) – who cares if the bribe is large enough. You get the government you pay for – wasn’t it Ronald Reagan who said there is no such thing as a free lunch.

[ANuttyReader]

06:08 PM on 11/04/2011

you can thank your GOP congressman and senators for that

[vippy]

02:32 PM on 11/04/2011

Government and states are broke and are laying off. For all those getting laid off more retail shops will close and the service industry will get less jobs. 100,000 postal jobs and military is cutting 50,000, AMD is laying off 1,400 and so it continues. Remember, election year and a lot of fake "positive" news.

[FlyboyDave]

12:18 PM on 11/04/2011

This is fantastic news. Not for those losing public sector jobs, but for the long-term stability of the economy. Public sector jobs are funded by the private sector. As long as the private sector continues to add at the same rate, that's great. The more people there are working in the private sector, the more revenues there will be for the dwindling pool of public workers that are a necessity - fire, police, teachers. A bunch fewer administrators would be a good thing.

[gravescanada]

09:21 AM on 11/05/2011

but its never the Administrators that get the axe or take a cut. They are IN the system, so they are taken care of by their friends. Why would anyone think that laying off Police, Firemen or Teachers is ever a good idea? These are vital services that should never be cut. That is why we need to bolster the states and local governments. Educations is a right in our nation. Educators are vital. Firemen are vital, what are you going to do when your house is on fire and they cant come? And police, we never need them till we NEED them.

[Ginny Fischer]

07:26 PM on 11/08/2011

"This is fantastic news"? 110,000 jobs last month and 116,000 the month before? We need double that amount just to keep up with population growth. And that doesn't count all of the soldiers coming home from Iraq by the end of the year.

[castlemike]

12:10 PM on 11/04/2011

http://jessescrossroadscafe.blogspot.com/

Non Farm Payrolls Number: An Early Christmas 'Goose' Stuffed with Baloney

The Birth-Death Model was out of normal to the high side enough to raise a comment. This is shown in the first slide. Lately the BLS statisticians had not resorted to this and had actually been running at estimates a little more to what one might expect in a business slump.

The headline number without the Birth Death model, deseasonalized, showed negative growth.

So the truth is probably that jobs growth was flat to negative. But even that nugget of truth is liable to be lost in future revisions. I wonder if the desire to show growth will skew the statistics even further as we go forward.

Typical games are to play with the chain deflator in GDP to make it look better, and to play with seasonality, birth-death model, and rolling revisions in the payrolls numbers. And of course the tinkering with CPI is apparent to anyone not carrying an agenda who has looked into the mechanics of the changes in the past ten years.

But I suppose since Obama is speaking this morning at the G20, and telling Europe how to solve its banking and debt problems as the US has done, a passable grade on jobs growth was de rigueur pour le charlatan.

[JustinP213]

08:57 AM on 11/04/2011

No one should be surprised by this. Many state and local governments across our country have serious budget shortfalls.

[vippy]

05:39 AM on 11/04/2011

Goofy headline. Government and states are laying off because they are broke and with more people not having an income this headlines claims private sector is creating jobs? Really. Post Office will lay off 100,000 people and the military is laying off 50,000. All those people will find jobs? I wonder what we are producing. No job is secure these days and it will come to a head in 2012 but because it will be an election year, the media will do its best to distort the truth! Find our for yourself! Even the government revised their forecast on GDP and unemployment so why the lies?

[bllnsinchnge]

06:39 AM on 11/04/2011

GDP is a joke, imagine buying a drone and a missle, blowing up a bridge, then sending in the Army Corp of engineers to rebuild it. All contribute to GDP!

you are better off looking at the non-government trade deficit and manufacturing indexes.

[imusintheevening]

11:44 AM on 11/04/2011

BEA numbers are always revised, and it is done as additional information becomes available.

[NorquistNemesis]

03:12 AM on 11/04/2011

What I don't see in this reporting/analyses is whether those government jobs are simply being transferred to private sector by means of contract labor. If so, that will end up costing more in the long run both from the government having to hire the contract labor and the loss of benefits (not to mention lower wages and less employment stability) for the employees.

[CountLeo]

11:50 PM on 11/03/2011

Though I often work on government projects I see this as a good sign. Government is typically over staffed and grossly inefficient. Government jobs tend to be regulatory and self-important. Let a more efficient and profit driven private sector with ten workers do what the public sector does poorly with twenty.

[babyspittle]

12:19 AM on 11/04/2011

lol, evidence suggests the exact opposite is true.

[CountLeo]

12:50 AM on 11/04/2011

Which evidence is that? I can plenty of fodder for my argument!

[vippy]

05:42 AM on 11/04/2011

Let us fire more people! Privatization always has laid off people, they are interested in the bottom line, government is not. Let emergencies come up and the government does not have sufficient people. Government does well with maintaining roads, etc. while it has been proven the private corporations can't handle it and are selling back the toll roads again, just one example.

[bllnsinchnge]

06:58 AM on 11/04/2011

You haven't proven it to me.

private roads work just fine, I drive on 3 of them regularly. The biggest problem with the road system is the franchise or leasing. The roads need to be sold outright and owned privately.

http://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Autopistas_urbanas_de_Santiago_de_Chile

[CountLeo]

02:14 PM on 11/04/2011

You make the obvious good point that there is legitimate roll for government in certain jobs. Just as obviously this doesn't argue against my point that government is almost always less efficient and more costly.

[kburgoyne]

11:01 PM on 11/03/2011

So the GOP House has destroyed 646K middle class jobs so far... and counting. Luckily the administration's original stimulus package prevented a full-on depression and has already lead to some job creation. If the GOP wasn't so busy destroying middle class jobs, we could be going a lot further to decreasing unemployment.

[bllnsinchnge]

07:02 AM on 11/04/2011

You missed half of the government the other party can do nothing but destroy jobs as well combined they have only delayed the depression. Death of America by a thousand cuts.

#endthefed

[throck93]

10:46 PM on 11/03/2011

I wish the article would break down the type of private sector jobs. Are these well paying positions or mostly fast-food joints/minimum wage???

[babyspittle]

12:20 AM on 11/04/2011

health care is the biggest gaining sector.

I doubt those are minimum wage jobs, though I appreciate your attempts to blunt any good news.
propagandists can suck a c__k

[vippy]

05:44 AM on 11/04/2011

Our hospitals in the area are laying off, this is the second time around.