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California Job Tracker: June 2014

Published June 10, 2014

Nine of State's Major Metro Areas Recover Lost Jobs

Nine of California's major metropolitan areas have recovered all of the jobs lost during the Recession, according to April 2014 nonfarm payroll data.

These include the metropolitan statistical areas (MSAs) of San Francisco, San Jose, San Diego, San Luis Obispo, Santa Barbara, El Centro, Bakersfield, Merced, and Napa.

Santa Barbara and Merced are the latest MSAs to recover. The other seven MSAs previously recovered.

The nine regions account for about 27% of the state’s total employment. (See Figure 5.) 

The dates of the pre-Recession peaks varied across the 2006-08 timeframe. Collectively, the nine metropolitan areas collectively have added 173,000 jobs relative to their prior employment highs. The San Francisco-San Mateo-Redwood City area has led with a job gain of nearly 78,000 jobs. San Jose has followed with a large net growth of 64,000 positions.

Certain parts of the state continue to lag behind. Los Angeles, the state's largest metropolitan area, is still down by about 63,000 jobs from its pre-Recession high. If average monthly job growth were to match that experienced in 2013, it would take about 10 months for the area to regain that employment level. 

Orange County, the Inland Empire (Riverside and San Bernardino Counties), and the Sacramento area also have large numbers of jobs to recoup.

California as a whole is almost back to its pre-Recession level of nonfarm payrolls, but its diversity means that individual regions are growing at significantly different speeds.

See raw data: Employment numbers by region

Figure 5: Regions Where Job Recovery Has Met Pre-Recession Peak

(Nonfarm employment, seasonally adjusted)

Sources: U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, California Employment Development Department, Fermanian Business and Economic Institute