Paul Krugman kills a myth about government employment, part 2

Here is part one, and here is part two:

First, what we’ve seen under Obama is a small rise in federal employment, swamped by a larger fall in state and local employment — reflecting the budget woes of the states, and the inadequacy of federal aid in the slump. So you see a small rise if you look only at the feds, but a decline if you look at the overall picture.

Second, most government workers are at the local level, and most of the rest are state workers; the federal government is a small piece of the total. And if you look at what they do, a lot of them are teachers; many of the rest are firefighters, police, and other occupations we sort of like.

Third, why has government employment grown over time? Because, um, we have a growing population. Here’s government employment as a share of the population: