State and local government employment up in 18 states.

• Position: News & Numbers

State and local government employment is down for April through June in 31 states, relative to year-earlier levels, but 18 states showed larger-than-average gains, according to the Nelson A. Rockefeller Institute of Government. State government employment is down in 28 states, and local government employment is down in 30 states, according to the institute's analysis of U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics data. Private-sector employment is down in 44 states. For the nation as a whole, state government employment is down 0.8 percent from its post-recession peak, and local government employment is down 1.4 percent. Private-sector employment, by contrast, is down 6.8 percent. Showing larger-than-average gains in both state and local government employment were North Carolina, Montana, South Carolina, Texas, Alaska, Delaware, Missouri, North Dakota, Wyoming, South Dakota, New Hampshire, Arkansas, Massachusetts, Minnesota, Nebraska, Oregon, New Jersey, and Colorado.

Local government employment is two to three times as large as state government employment in most states, and it accounts for the largest number of government jobs lost in the current recession, the institute's paper, "State and Local Government Employment Is Down in 31 States--And Up In 18--Compared With A Year Ago," noted. Elementary and secondary education tends to dominate local government employment, although non-education employment is down as well. The decline in education employment is greater in this recession than in other recent recessions, and is comparable to...