You're right, that was a made-up statistic that I guessed on the spot.

Government-financed jobs (private and public sector jobs financed directly by the government) make up 27.3% of employers in DC, 29.8% of employers in Virginia, and 15.9% of employers in Maryland[1]. Federal job share (how many jobs are working directly for the government) in DC is 27.4%, in Virginia it's 4.6%, and in Maryland it's 5.5%[2].

So if you live in DC 54.7% of employers are either the federal government itself or working for an employer that is financed directly by the government. I apologize for the rounding error in my made-up statistic earlier.

[1]http://mercatus.org/publication/government-financed-employme... [2]http://www.governing.com/gov-data/federal-employees-workforc...