While California’s economy has long outpaced those of most nations, the unemployment rate has increased sizably over the past year.
The 5.1 percent unemployment rate in December — an entire percentage point higher than a year ago — was well above the national rate of 3.7 percent. The only state faring worse was Nevada at 5.3 percent, according to recently revised figures from the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
California has historically had higher unemployment rates than the U.S. average, because of its young and fast-growing work force. But the state was about on par with the nation in the early part of the pandemic recovery — 4 percent in California in May 2022 versus 3.6 percent nationwide.
Since then, a wave of deep cuts hit workers at several big tech companies, and entertainment-related employers have only slowly begun to rebound after a pair of Hollywood strikes last year. The unemployment rate in Los Angeles County is 5 percent.
In more rural stretches of the state, including Imperial County along the Mexican border, where agriculture is a key economic engine, the unemployment rate is in double digits — about 18 percent, up 3.1 percentage points from a year ago.
The state has seen job growth in education and health care, along with the leisure and hospitality industries.
Kevin Klowden, an executive director at the Milken Institute, an economic think tank in Santa Monica, said Hollywood would take months, if not years, to return to what it looked like before the strikes.
“There are a lot of stories about actors and crews having trouble finding consistent work because of the slow ramp-up of new productions,” he said. And some restaurants and other small businesses that relied on workers in television and film production, he said, will probably never reopen.
