tool name

Saturday, Nov. 21, 2009

State unemployment at an all-time high of 12.5 percent

Merced County's unemployment rate bumped up slightly in October to 16.4 percent, according to data released Friday by the state.

That number rose from September's unemployment rate of 15.7 percent.

Unemployment reached its highest level this year in Merced County at 20.2 percent in March.

National and state unemployment numbers also increased in October according the Bureau of Labor Statistics -- but they were still much lower than Merced's.

In October the national unemployment rate rose to its highest since 1983, to 10.2 percent. In October there were 15.7 million unemployed persons in the country.

The state's unemployment rate also rose in October to 12.5 percent.

According to the state's Employment Development Department Merced County lost 200 jobs in October. The actual number of unemployed in the county was 17,600 in October out of a total work force of 107,000.

The county's job losses came from the manufacturing, leisure and hospitality industries, said Pedro Vargas, the county's labor market consultant.

These manufacturing losses were mainly because of the pending closure of the NUMMI GM-Toyota automobile plant in Fremont, said Vargas. Manufacturers in Merced supplied the plant. "We only lost 100 jobs in manufacturing, but still 100 jobs is a lot," he said.

These numbers don't reflect the total losses in Merced from the closure of NUMMI, said Vargas, since he expects more layoffs in November.

The county's unemployment rate comes from a monthly survey of county employers conducted by the state, said Vargas.

The ranks of the county's unemployed may be higher than the survey indicates, since the survey doesn't include people without jobs who have not looked for new work in the last four weeks, he added.

The national and state unemployment numbers also don't include workers discouraged and no longer looking for work, so the real number of people without work may be higher than reported.

For instance, according to the BLS, in October there were 2.4 million Americans categorized as "marginally attached" to the work force, since they had not looked for work in the last four weeks.

In addition to discouraged and marginal workers, 9.3 million people nationwide didn't have full time employment.

If you add these number to the 15.7 million officially unemployed, the number of people with little or no work would be 27.4 million or roughly 17 percent of the work force.

Reporter Jonah Owen Lamb can be reached at (209) 385-2484 or jlamb@mercedsun-star.com