Nonprofit organizations play a vital role in local economies in the United States, employing nearly 12.8 million people, paying billions in wages, and providing essential services to communities. On July 2, EWMI’s partner, the Center on Nonprofits, Philanthropy, and Social Enterprise’s George Mason University – Nonprofit Employment Data Project (GMU-NED) released a new report, Nonprofit Employment in the States, 2017–2022. The report examines the latest available data on nonprofit employment and wages in 53 U.S. states and territories between 2017 and 2022. A supplementary data dashboard provides field-level data over this same period.
Drawing on data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), the report highlights state-level nonprofit employment and wages between 2017-2022. It examines how the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic impacted nonprofit employment in the states and territories, how state-level nonprofit employment had recovered as of 2022, and how nonprofit employment and wages compared to their counterparts in the for-profit sector during this crucial period.
The supplementary data dashboard drills into these data to provide additional information on the number of nonprofit establishments operating in each state, the fields in which they are active, and how these patterns shifted during and in the years immediately following the COVID-19 pandemic. This report follows up on the December 2024 Nonprofit Employment Report which provided an overview of national-level data on nonprofit employment and wage trends between 2017 and 2022.
The report is structured around five key findings:
- Nonprofit wages rose faster than for-profit wages in the majority of states during the recovery period;
- Nonprofits are a major employer in virtually every state and territory in the U.S.;
- 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.