Bay Area gains slow as post-COVID rebound wilts
Job gains slowed in the Bay Area and California during April, a sign the economic rebound in the wake of the coronavirus outbreak has begun to wilt statewide and in this region, a report released Friday shows.
The Bay Area added 11,500 jobs in April, but those gains represented a dramatic slowdown from the employment gains in both February and March, according to new employment figures revealed by the government.
Similarly, California gained 41,400 jobs during April, but last month’s upswing was considerably smaller than the increases in employment for February and March, this news organization’s analysis of the government report shows.
The statewide unemployment rate in April was 4.6%, an improvement from the 4.8% jobless rate posted in March.
California’s unemployment rate is the lowest that it’s been since February 2020, the month before state and local government agencies imposed wideranging business shutdowns in a quest to combat the spread of the coronavirus. Those restrictions and closures unleashed mammoth layoffs and a spike in the jobless rate.
Santa Clara County added 4,300 jobs in April, while the San FranciscoSan Mateo region added 4,900 positions and the East Bay gained 2,100 jobs, the report showed.
All the numbers were adjusted for seasonal variations.
Yet the gains in the Bay Area’s three largest metro centers last month followed the statewide and regional patterns and were far below the increases in employment for both February and March.
The Bay Area job gains totaled 22,100 in February and 15,200 in March, well ahead of the increase of 11,500 in April. The California job gains were 135,400 in February but decelerated to an increase of 74,400 jobs in March and 41,400 in April.
The red-hot pace of inflation could be having an effect on economic activity because the spike in prices has chewed up the pocketbooks and eroded the spending power of the typical consumer.
Plus, rising wages — another contributor to the sharp surge in the inflation rate — could prompt employers to scale back hiring due to the rise in their labor costs.