Source: Donald J. Boyd and Lucy Dadayan, Nelson A. Rockefeller Institute of Government, Data Alert, August 10, 2010

Friday’s July employment report from the Bureau of Labor Statistics showed that total employment in the nation declined by 131,000 jobs. The decline was driven by a combination of very weak growth in the private sector (+71,000 jobs), a large decline in federal government employment (-154,000) primarily reflecting the departure of 143,000 temporary Census 2010 workers, and a decline of 48,000 in state and local government jobs.