9.3%? Nonsense. Double Digit Unemployment Has Come to California.

Last week the California Employment Development Board announced that the state’s unemployment rate climbed  to 9.3%.   As ugly as this number is, it’s deceptively low…the truth is much uglier.

31 of California’s 58 counties report double digit unemployment, the population centers where most of the labor force reside are already past 10%, and the state’s exurban and rural areas are in the worst shape of all.  With more layoffs to come, we are weeks away from a statewide average over 10%.

The Jobless Rate in Southern California

Let’s start with Southern California.  Los Angeles County is only at 9.5%, but that’s only because L.A. County’s relatively recession-proof cities  like Beverly Hills (6.6%), Calabassas (4.1%), Manhattan Beach (3.3%) among others keep it below 10%.  The actual city of Los Angeles itself, with a labor force of almost 2 million, is at 10.5% unemployment.  Long Beach, with a workforce of 240,000 is also at 10.5%.

And in an  irony of all ironies, LA County’s city of of Commerce boasts the county’s highest jobless rate at 17.5%.  with the City of Industry not much better at 15.9%.  The good news is that the county has the city of Vernon, the one city in the state with 0% unemployment, of course they have an unfair advantage since they have zero people in their labor force.

As for the rest of the  Southern California Megalopolis — Riverside County has crossed the double digit threshold, they’re at a 10.5% jobless rate and they’re about to have some company — San Bernardino County comes in at  9.7% and  Ventura is at 8.0%.

Orange County looks like its better off at 6.5%, but that’s actually high considering that 21 of the county’s 40 cities have an average household income above $75,000/year; of those 21, 9 are above $100,000/year and 15 above $90,000/year.  More telling is looking where OC’s largest concentrated labor force resides — Santa Ana where the jobless rate clocks in at 10.4%.  Among the Orange County unemployed are 200 recently laid off  public assistance workers who process claims for things like food stamps and other public assistance.  Interesting.

The Exurbs and Rural Areas

Things are much worse  in the Central Valley, the  cities and their surrounding suburbs (known as “Metropolitan Statistical Areas”) paint a grim picture. The Fresno MSA is at 13.2%, Merced MSA at 15.5% , and Bakersfield MSA at 11.2%.

But the grimmest picture comes from Imperial County along the Mexican border, where 22.6% of the labor force are not working. Almost 1 in 4 people are jobless.  How bad is that?  Well…during the Great Depression unemployment in the United States was at 25%.

The Bright Spot

The good news is that this too shall pass.  We’re all in this together.   This is something that all Californians are feeling…unless of course you live in the San Francisco Bay Area, where as usual, they’re living in an alternate reality.    Marin, San Mateo and San Francisco Counties all boast jobless rates below 7%, Marin has the state’s lowest at 5.4%   Which makes sense, since you can’t afford to live there unless you have a job.