The Center on Nonprofits, Philanthropy, and Social Enterprise in George Mason University’s Schar School of Policy and Government is pleased to announce the release of a new report, Nonprofit Employment in the States, 2017-2022, from the George Mason University – Nonprofit Employment Data Project (GMU-NED) focusing on nonprofit employment and wages in 53 states and territories between 2017 and 2022. A supplementary data dashboard provides field-level data over this same period.
This report follows up on our December 2024 Nonprofit Employment Report which provided an overview of national-level data on nonprofit employment and wages between 2017 and 2022 from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics’ Quarterly Census of Employment and Wages (QCEW). Drawing on this same dataset, Nonprofit Employment in the States examines state-level 501(c)(3) nonprofit employment and wages in 2022, how the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic impacted nonprofit employment in the states and territories, and how state-level nonprofit employment had recovered as of 2022. Due to the unique nature of the underlying dataset, we are also able to compare nonprofit employment and wages to their counterparts in the for-profit sector during this crucial period. The report is structured around five key findings:
- Nonprofits are a major employer in virtually every state and territory;
- Nonprofit wages are a crucial component of state economies;
- Nonprofits in most states retained more of their workforce than their for-profit counterparts in 2020 during the onset of the COVID pandemic;
- However, nonprofits in most states struggled to keep up with for-profits during the first two years of recovery from the pandemic in 2021 and 2022; and
- Nonprofit wages rose faster than for-profit wages in the majority of states during the recovery period.
To supplement this report, we have developed a…
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