Private employment has dropped nine times faster than state and local government employment in New York since last year, according to a report issued today by the Albany-based Rockefeller Institute. But the national trend showed even more of a disparity between the private and public sectors. The report’s main finding: “Private sector employment for the nation as a whole has fallen by 6.9 million jobs between the December 2007 start of the recession and July 2009. Over the same period, state and local government employment has risen by 110 thousand jobs or 0.6 percent, with increases in both state governments and local governments.”
Thirty states added government jobs while losing private jobs between the April-June quarter of 2008 and the same quarter of this year, the Rockefeller Institute found. New York was one of 16 states in which combined state-local government employment dropped during that period. In New York’s case, private employment dropped 2.7 percent, less than half the national average decrease of 5.9 percent, while state-local government jobs decreased 0.3 percent, compared to a national average increase of 0.6 percent.
The decrease in government employment in New York was concentrated entirely at the state level, where payrolls fell 2 percent. Local government employment in New York increased by 0.1 percent, the report said.
Continued growth in government payriolls after the start opf a recession is “a typical pattern,” the Rockefeller Institute’s Don Boyd noted, but “further employment reductions are almost certainly on the way.”
You may also like
Albany Should Listen to Jamie Dimon
In his annual message to shareholders, JP Morgan Chase's chief executive, Jamie Dimon, offered a timely and pointed warning for New York policymakers.
It's worth , with emphasis add Read More
At mid-year, NY still far below most states in pandemic jobs recovery
New York has added private-sector jobs in all but three of the 38 months since the COVID-19 outbreak of March 2020—but the Empire State remains below its pre-pandemic employment level and continues to trail the national recovery.
On a seasonally adju Read More
At end of ’22, NY still near bottom in pandemic recovery
The more time passes since the spring 2020 Covid-19 outbreak, the more New York stands out among all states for the weakness of its post-pandemic employment recovery.
As of December, seasonally adjusted private employment in New York was still nearly 2 Read More
As leaves turn, NY’s post-pandemic recovery still has very far to go
New York was the national epicenter of the pandemic, and Governor Cuomo's "New York State on PAUSE" business shutdowns and other restrictions led, in short order, to the loss of nearly 2 million jobs in the first full month after the infection began spreading in the New York City area. Read More
More NY job gains in August—but employment needs to rise a lot further
New York's jobs report for August looked relatively strong—but only by comparison, that is, with what was generally regarded as a disappointing national number. On a seasonally adjusted basis, New York gained 28,000 private-sector jobs last month—a growth rate of 0.4 percent, according to preliminary monthly estimates from the state Labor Department. Read More
NY Post-Pandemic Employment Tide Stopped Rising At Year’s End
New York's post-pandemic employment recovery came to a halt and moved into reverse in December, according to the state's for the final month of COVID-wracked 2020.
Private payroll employment in December was 966,000 jobs below the level of the previous Read More
Fewer Workers, Not More Jobs, Explains NY’s September Unemployment Rate Drop
New York State's unemployment rate has fallen sharply since the economically devastating pandemic lockdown last spring. But as state Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli points out in his latest economic report, the jobless rate doesn't tell the whole story. Read More
It’s Official: New York State’s Second Quarter Economic Crash Was the Worst on Record
Further evidence of the massive damage done to New York’s economy by the coronavirus pandemic shutdown has emerged in the latest gross domestic product (GDP) data from the federal Commerce Department's Bureau of Economic Affairs. Read More