The reduction in federal employment hits as the local economy is coming off one of its best years in recent memory. The DC metropolitan area added 62,400 jobs in the one-year period ending in February, according to the new government data.
Unemployment rates held steady in Maryland and the District at 4.2 per cent and 5.7 per cent, respectively, and dropped to 3.9 per cent in Virginia, despite a healthy influx of new job-seekers.
Beyond the immediate hiring freeze, Trump is proposing big reductions to federal agencies such as the State Department and the Environmental Protection Agency, cuts that probably would have an outsize impact on the DC area.
Office of Management and Budget Director Mick Mulvaney has said the agency cuts would probably mean layoffs, and the budget cuts Trump is seeking could hurt federal contractors.
A preliminary analysis by the Stephen S. Fuller Institute at George Mason University predicts that the president's budget in its current form would cause the region to lose at least 20,000 federal jobs and take at least $2.3 billion in federal salaries out of the economy. The same analysis predicted that the budget would eliminate up to 12,000 private-sector contractor jobs here by decreasing procurement spending.
"I think this underscores our vulnerability to future federal cutbacks," said the institute's namesake, economist Stephen S. Fuller. "There is already a dampening of growth being experienced in the Washington area because of the uncertainty of the new administration."