Just for the Record
In 1961, under the last Eisenhower budget, there were 782,000 executive
branch, non-defense employees in the Federal Government. By the end of
2001
that number had risen to 1,151,000 employees. That is an increase of
369,000
employees or a 47% increase over the 40 year period.
We decided to determine in which presidential terms that increase
occurred.
In order to do so, we looked at the years 1962 through 2001. We assigned
credit or blame to an administration for the years for which it submitted
a
budget. Thus, for our purposes, the Kennedy term runs from 1962-1965. The
Johnson term runs from 1966-1969 etc.
Kennedy 1962-1965
The last Eisenhower budget had 782,000 non-defense employees. By the end
of
the Kennedy term that number had risen to 857,000. The Kennedy
administration is assigned responsibility for the addition of 75,000
government employees.
Johnson 1966-1969
The Johnson years saw the number of government employees rise to 960,000.
His administration is assigned responsibility for the addition of 103,000
employees.
Nixon (which include the Ford years) 1970-1977
The Nixon years saw non-defense government employees rise from 960,000 in
Johnson's last year to 1,173,000 in 1977. Nixon (and Ford) have
responsibility for an increase of 213,000 employees.
Carter 1978-1981
During the Carter years, the number of non-defense federal employees
dropped
by 14,000.
Reagan 1982-1989
In the Reagan years, the federal workforce increased by 3,000 employees.
Bush 1990-1993
Under George Herbert Walker Bush, the number of non-defense government
employees increased from 1,162,000 to 1,256,000 for a gain of 94,000
employees.
Clinton 1993-2001
During the Clinton years the number of non-defense government employees
fell
from 1,256,000 to 1,151,000 for a decrease of 105,000 employees.
Conclusion
Under the 20 years of Republican administrations the number of non-defense
government employees rose by 310,000.
Under the 20 years of Democratic administrations, the number of
non-defense
government employees rose by 59,000.
Of the 369,000 employees added between 1962 and 2001, 84% were added under
Republican administrations and 16% were added under Democratic
administrations.
We got our data here at table 17-1.
http://w3.access.gpo.gov/usbudget/fy2003/pdf/hist.pdf
Most of these goodies can be found as individual spreadsheets (much
smaller
downloads, easier math manipulation) here:
http://www.whitehouse.gov/omb/budget/fy2003/hist.html
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