25% of jobs added in the US economy over the past two years were government jobs, up from 5% in 2021 and 7% in 2022.
#26 | Posted by visitor
Trump repeats misleading claim that one in four jobs added under Biden was a government job
President Donald Trump on Friday touted the February jobs report, highlighting the estimated 10,000 manufacturing jobs added versus 10,000 federal government jobs lost.
In doing so, he lobbed a familiar--but highly misleading--claim about one of the biggest job generators in recent years.
"Under the final two years of Biden, one in every four jobs created in America was a government job," Trump said from the Oval Office Friday morning.
While 26% of the past two years' job gains were in the government sector, the lion's share of those public sector gains took place in state and local government employment (including schools and hospitals)--not the federal workforce.
In 2023 and 2024, state-level government employment (which has a workforce of 2.6 million) increased by 376,000 jobs, accounting for 8% of the overall job gains, Bureau of Labor Statistics data shows.
Local governments (where 15.1 million people work) saw net growth of 672,000 jobs in that period, accounting for 15% of the nationwide gains.
The federal government (3 million workers) added 139,000 jobs, representing a 3% share of the national gains.