After posting modest employment gains during a recession that wiped out thousands of jobs in Minnesota, the nonprofit sector has continued to add jobs during the recovery.
"The nonprofit sector is kind of the resilient sector," said Jon Pratt, executive director of the Minnesota Council of Nonprofits, which publishes an annual report on the sector.
In the recession years of 2008 and 2009, the sector posted gains of 3.4 percent and 1 percent respectively. "Unlike business, when there is a drop in construction you lay people off … but the nonprofits still have work to do," Pratt said.
Over the last five years, nonprofit employment growth in Minnesota has averaged about 1.5 percent year, according to the report. "Health care certainly continues to take off. That is both organic growth, growing their operations, and also consolidations," Pratt said.
Nonprofits accounted for 11.5 percent of Minnesota's total workforce in 2012 and 2013. The council reports Minnesota ranked ninth among states for share of nonprofit employment in 2012.
The growth of Minnesota's nonprofit health care sector has also had a dramatic impact on compensation for nonprofit employees.
"Health care compensation over the last 10 years has dramatically increased, way beyond inflation," Pratt said. That is in part attributed to the consolidation of private physician groups by nonprofits due to reimbursement rules that favor hospital organizations over independent physician groups and stand-alone treatment centers.
According to the council's report, average nonprofit wages rose to within 2 percent of for-profit wages, thanks primarily to hospitals and higher education. Excluding hospitals and high ed, average wages at nonprofits were 10 percent below their for-profit counterparts in 2013.
