According to statistics the U.S. Census Bureau released today, the 90,740 state and local governments across the country employed 16.6 million full-time equivalent workers in 2010.

What jobs do these employees perform? Some are police officers, others work in the court. In 2010, the majority of employees worked in the education field. Secondary and elementary education alone employed about 9.0 million people around the country.

Hospitals were the second largest employer of state and local employees (986,471); police protection was next (946,196), followed by corrections (731,692).

Overall, most states saw declines in state and local employment. Among state governments, Idaho, Connecticut and Rhode Island saw the largest declines in full-time equivalent employment, each losing about 5 percent of their workforce. Texas saw the largest percent increase (5.9 percent), adding about 17,800 to its workforce.

Among local governments, North Dakota saw the largest increase (7.5 percent) in employment, while Rhode Island showed the biggest decline (7.7 percent).

When we examined the composition of the growth in employment in North Dakota, we see that the majority is due to an increase in full-time instructional employees or teachers. In Rhode Island the decline in employment was driven largely by a reduction in instructional employees.

For more statistics about state and local government employment, including part-time employment, see the tables released today: