On August 1, 2025, the United States was jolted by a jobs report that revealed 258,000 fewer jobs than initially reported for May and June, sending ripples through state economies and igniting a firestorm of controversy in Washington. The revision, the largest outside a recession since 1968, prompted President Donald Trump to loudly dispute the numbers, claiming they were "RIGGED in order to make the Republicans, and ME, look bad," as reported by Stateline. Trump’s response was swift and dramatic: he fired the Bureau of Labor Statistics chief and put forward E.J. Antoni, a loyalist who had previously proposed suspending the jobs report altogether.
But beyond the headlines and political theatrics, the numbers paint a sobering picture of the American workforce, especially in states like Virginia, New Jersey, and Oklahoma. Each is grappling with unique challenges, from federal cutbacks and industry layoffs to workforce shortages and looming healthcare crises.
In Virginia, the effects of the hiring slowdown have been particularly acute. According to Stateline, the state lost approximately 43,000 jobs in the second quarter of 2025, marking job losses every month since February—an abrupt reversal after a period of steady gains since the pandemic’s peak in April 2020. Much of the pain can be traced to canceled federal contracts in Northern Virginia, a result of cost-cutting efforts by Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE). The cuts were far from abstract, as Jay Ford, Virginia policy manager at the Chesapeake Bay Foundation, told a state legislative committee that $50 million in contracts were slashed in the Hampton Roads area alone. That included $20 million earmarked for flood mitigation in Hampton—where nearly a quarter of homes sit in flood zones—and $24 million to repair a Portsmouth dam at risk of failing during a major storm. Ford didn’t mince words: "This is work that you desperately needed. There was a real focus on certain buzzwords like ‘climate’ or ‘resilience,’ and I think people conflated some of these projects as somehow unnecessary."
The fallout extended to the private sector as well. The American Institutes for Research, a nonprofit specializing in everything from closing educational achievement gaps to improving kidney disease care, announced 233 layoffs in Virginia in May and another 50 in Maryland since the start of the year. Dana Tofig, an AIR spokesperson, said, "The changes occurring in the federal government have brought significant challenges for many federal contractors, including AIR." Similarly, Mitre, a key defense research contractor in Northern Virginia, laid off 442 workers after $28 million in contracts vanished. And in Southern Virginia, Georgia-Pacific shuttered a plywood factory, laying off 554 workers—a move the company attributed to sluggish home sales and a 30-year low in existing home purchases. "Housing affordability challenges and a 30-year low in existing home sales are impacting our plywood business, as many of our plywood products are used in repair and remodel projects, which often occur when homes change ownership," Georgia-Pacific explained in a May news release.
New Jersey, too, has been battered by the economic headwinds. The state lost 15,400 jobs in the second quarter, with the retail sector especially hard hit. Walmart’s Hoboken corporate office announced 481 layoffs, while Rite Aid, reeling from Chapter 11 bankruptcy and lawsuits related to the opioid crisis, cut 1,122 jobs. Pharma giants Bristol Myers Squibb and Novartis each announced hundreds of layoffs, blaming patent expirations on blockbuster drugs for the reductions. The cumulative effect, as Lucy Dadayan of the Urban-Brookings Tax Policy Center put it, signals "economic fragility." She warned, "I think the dramatic May and June jobs revision signals economic fragility. State-level warning signs suggest the impacts will show gradually. And of course states are facing fiscal challenges caused by One Big Beautiful Bill Act tax and spending decisions."
Nationally, the unemployment rate ticked up to 4.2% in July 2025, a notable jump from the 3.4% seen in April. Mississippi, Virginia, and Oregon saw the sharpest increases, while California, Nevada, and Michigan posted the highest overall rates. In contrast, states like South Dakota, North Dakota, and Vermont maintained the lowest unemployment figures.
Yet, not all states are mired in gloom. Texas and California bucked the trend, posting job gains in the second quarter. Texas added 42,700 jobs, led by a surge of 14,400 positions in private educational services after the state approved a new school voucher plan. California, meanwhile, registered 25,300 new jobs in the payroll survey and an eye-popping 111,000 in the household survey—the highest in the country. According to a Public Policy Institute of California blog post authored by Sarah Bohn, the state’s labor market was "at best, in a hold-steady pattern this year," but even that was seen as an improvement over the previous year’s turbulence.
Oklahoma presents a different, but equally complex, set of workforce challenges. In a televised discussion on August 30, 2025, state officials and policy experts highlighted a severe shortage of trades workers, with the average plumber now aged 58—far above the ideal age of 42 needed to sustain the pipeline of skilled labor. The state’s robust apprenticeship programs, especially within unions, are helping, but demand for engineers remains high due to the aerospace industry’s needs. Over half of Oklahoma’s counties lack an OB-GYN, and two-thirds are considered "childcare deserts," severely limiting women’s ability to participate in the workforce.
Oklahoma’s highly regarded career tech system, governed locally to tailor training to area job markets, offers a lifeline for many seeking entry into medical and technical fields. However, career counseling in public education is underfunded and often neglected, prompting calls for greater collaboration between schools, colleges, and career techs to guide students toward sustainable careers—especially as AI and technology continue to reshape the job landscape.
Healthcare in rural Oklahoma faces a looming crisis, with Medicaid cuts slated for 2026 expected to shutter many rural medical facilities and nursing homes. The majority of Medicaid recipients in the state work full-time in jobs that offer no health insurance, meaning the loss of Medicaid will leave many uninsured—an echo of what happened during the 2008-2009 recession before Medicaid expansion dollars arrived.
Amid these economic uncertainties, concerns are growing about the integrity of employment data itself. Commissioner Osborne, speaking on the recent firing of the Bureau of Labor Statistics director and the appointment of a more partisan figure, cautioned, "The recent firing of the Bureau of Labor Statistics director and replacement with a partisan figure threatens the reliability of national data." He urged Oklahomans to rely on local news and direct government sources, and to actively participate in advocacy and policymaking. "State layoff figures are giving us an early read," wrote workforce analyst Amanda Goodall, also known as "The Job Chick." "These are not statistical flukes. They reflect real corporate moves, in New Jersey and Virginia especially. The bigger issue is that nobody on the ground cares what the unemployment rate says if they can’t find an interview for a job they’re qualified for."
Oklahoma’s economic future is also tied to the rise of new tech industries and renewable energy. While data centers bring a burst of initial construction jobs, they offer few long-term positions and consume vast amounts of electricity, a concern for both job creation and utility rates. On the energy front, wind power now plays an outsized role in Oklahoma’s power supply, helping stabilize rates and support agriculture. Negative rhetoric against renewables, officials argue, is unfounded, especially as countries like China race ahead in clean energy investment, threatening to shift entire industries overseas.
Despite the challenges, there are bright spots. The Oklahoma Department of Labor has recovered $1.5 million in unpaid wages for workers last year, providing crucial support for the state’s most vulnerable. And across the country, states continue to experiment with policy solutions, hoping to weather the storm of economic uncertainty and emerge stronger on the other side.
As the nation awaits the release of the Quarterly Census of Employment and Wages for the second quarter on December 3, 2025, policymakers and workers alike are left to grapple with a rapidly changing landscape—one where every data point, every job lost or gained, carries real consequences for American families.
