As farm jobs end, Merced County unemployment rate rises

The unemployment rate in Merced County was 12.3 percent in November, up from a revised 10.4 percent from the previous month, according to numbers released Friday from the Employment Development Department.

A loss of seasonal farm jobs played a large role in the higher jobless rate, but November’s rate was a full percentage point lower than the same time last year.

Pedro Vargas, a labor analyst with the EDD, said the 3,000 farm jobs lost were on par with the number of jobs lost in November of recent years.

But the county also lost 400 manufacturing jobs, which are often related to the production of crops. “That didn’t happen last year,” he said.

There were about 300 new retail jobs in November, but that’s expected during the busy Christmas shopping season, he said. Many of those positions are seasonal.

Mark Hendrickson, Merced County director of community and economic development, said economic activity has risen in the last year. The unemployment numbers each month have improved all year when compared with the same time a year ago.

“(It) seems to suggest that we are trending in the right direction,” he said. “So that’s positive, but (the report) also suggests that we have great work to do ahead.”

To that end, the county this month approved an agreement, already ratified by each of its six cities, to team up to market the entire region. The plan will include a new website and other marketing materials to promote the cities and county to those looking for a place to build a new business.

“Whether a job is created in Atwater or Los Banos or anywhere in between, that’s a win for the entire county,” he said.

California’s unemployment rate dipped to 7.2 percent in November, a tenth of a percentage point improvement over October. The state added 90,100 payroll jobs in November.

It’s the third time this year that the state gained more than 60,000 jobs in a month.

The number of new jobs in November is more than three times the roughly 25,000 jobs that had been created each month on average since 2013, said Michael Bernick, a former department director who is now a fellow at the Milken Institute.

“I think there’s no question there’s something going on in the California economy that we haven’t seen this year,” he said. He expects stronger growth will continue through at least the first half of 2015, given that the gains extended across all industries and areas of the state.

Stephen Levy, senior economist for the Center for Continuing Study of the California Economy in Palo Alto, said the job market is now strong enough to draw back some of those who stopped looking for work during the recession.

He, too, predicted the trend will continue, calling it “good news for the holiday season and the year ahead” in a written analysis.

November is the strongest seasonal hiring month, but California saw just 43,000 new jobs created in November 2012 and 58,000 in the same month last year.

For the year, nine of the 11 employment categories tracked by EDD reported increases. The state reported 392,610 people receiving unemployment benefits in November, up slightly from the previous month.

California has added more than 1.5 million nonfarm payroll jobs since the recession.

The Associated Press contributed to this story.

This story was originally published December 19, 2014 at 10:45 AM with the headline "As farm jobs end, Merced County unemployment rate rises."