Health services, with over 300,000 jobs, accounts for the largest single private source of employment. New Jersey is also headquarters to the pharmaceutical industry, home to seven of the fifteen largest pharmaceutical companies. In the 1990s, New Jersey-based pharmaceutical firms were responsible for up to a third of new drug approvals by the Food and Drug Administration. From 1998 through 1999 New Jersey's total unemployment rate ranged from 4.1 percent to 4.5 percent, mirroring the national rate, which ranged from 4.2 percent to 4.5 percent. 6 Union membership is comparatively high in the state.
New Jersey ranks second in the nation in both per capita and median household income.
As a result, the percentage of New Jersey's population living in poverty is much lower than the national average. In 1997, 9.3 percent of New Jerseyans had incomes below the poverty level, compared to 13.3 percent nationally. Fewer school-aged children live in poverty in New Jersey, 15.3 percent compared to 18.8 percent nationally. Adult New Jerseyans also compare favorably on educational attainment. In 1997, 84.8 percent of state residents 25 and over had completed high school, compared to 82.1 percent nationally, and 28.5 percent had completed a bachelor's degree or more, compared to 23.9 percent.