October’s nonprofit jobs report brought good news with nearly 45,000 jobs being added during the month. The sector has now recovered 70% of the 1.64 million jobs initially estimated to have been lost during the first three months of the pandemic.
October saw a significant gain of 44,576 nonprofit jobs, reducing the total lost jobs by 8.3% of the 536,073 jobs still lost as of September, according to new data from the Center for Civil Society Studies at Johns Hopkins University (CCSS).
Of the major fields of nonprofit activity tracked by CCSS, healthcare had the strongest recovery in terms of jobs added in October, regaining roughly 16,100 estimated jobs, or 7.5% of the jobs still missing in this field as of September.
October 2021 was the first month since the onset of the pandemic that recorded a slight recovery of jobs in nonprofit nursing and residential care facilities, which added an estimated 1,300 workers during the month. However, jobs in this sub-field remain down by more than 139,000 versus pre-pandemic staffing levels.
Educational institutions meanwhile added more than 12,000 total jobs or 9% of the jobs still missing as of September. Social assistance organizations added nearly 4,000 workers during the month, reducing the number of jobs missing in this field by 6.6%; and nonprofit arts, entertainment, and recreational organizations continued to recover, adding an estimated 3,200 jobs during the month, or 6.4% of the still-missing jobs in this field.
But, religious, grantmaking, civic, professional, and similar organizations lost an estimated nearly 1,800 additional jobs during the month, an increase of 4.5% in missing jobs versus September’s staffing levels.
Prior to the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, U.S. nonprofits accounted for at least 12.5 million total jobs. As reported in CCSS’s 2020 Nonprofit Employment Report, during the first three months of the pandemic (March, April, and May 2020), nonprofits lost a conservatively estimated 1.64 million of those jobs, reducing the nonprofit workforce by 13.2% as of May 2020.
During June, July, and August 2020, some 40.6% of the initial 1.64 million lost nonprofit jobs were recovered. Beginning in September 2020, however, this recovery slowed significantly, with the months of September 2020-February 2021 seeing a combined recovery of just 4.2% of the initial lost jobs overall. A stronger recovery trend began in March 2021, with March through August seeing a combined recovery of an additional 22.3% of initial estimated job losses.
Following a minimal recovery in September, October saw a rebound, with 2.7% of initial estimated job losses recovered.
To see the full report, go to http://ccss.jhu.edu/october-2021-jobs/
