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Public Information Office CB00-127
301-457-3030/301-457-3670
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e-mail: pio@census.gov
Ellen Thompson
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State and Local Government Employment Up
1.5 Percent in 1999, Census Bureau Says
State and local governments employed 14.7 million full-time equivalent
workers in 1999, 1.5 percent more than in 1998, according to tabulations
for the 50 states and the District of Columbia released today by the
Commerce Department's Census Bureau. Of the total, local governments
employed 10.7 million employees and state governments, 4.0 million.
Full-time equivalents include the number of full-time employees who
could have been employed if the hours worked by part-time employees had
been worked by full-time employees. For instance, two people working half
days would be considered as one full-time equivalent.
The tabulations from the 1999 Annual Survey of State and Local
Government Employment and Payroll data show that most full-time
equivalent employees worked in education (7.6 million), hospitals
(952,000) and police protection (849,000). Other employment categories
include corrections, streets and highways, public welfare, health,
judicial-legal, financial-administration and fire protection.
As with all surveys, the data are subject to sampling variability, as
well as nonsampling error. Sources of nonsampling error include errors of
response, nonreporting and coverage. Measures of sampling variability,
presented as relative standard errors, are shown in the tables.
available free from Adobe.
