The California Labor Market Information Division (LMID) released its January 2022 report earlier today, later than per the usual schedule of the 3rd Friday of the following month, accommodating time for LMID’s annual recalibration of the data.

Not surprisingly, we had an increase in the unemployment rate, from 4.2% in December to 4.7% in January, generally the result of the layoff of holiday season workers that were hired in November and December.

All told, for the total of officially unemployed workers (by which we mean, not counting the several thousand workers that have dropped out of the labor force during the pandemic), we had a jump from 17,000 to 19,300. Of that increase by 2,300, it appears they were split about evenly between layoffs in Retail Trade and Leisure & Hospitality.

At least we conjecture as much. The January picture is likely a bit more complicated than what we describe above, as it’s tricky from the published data to correlate newly unemployed workers (such data being derived by interviews of the labor force) to specific industries (that is, industry or employer reported data), as the data sets for each—workers vs. jobs—are separately calculated. Further complicating the picture is the annual recalibration—or re-setting of the baseline—for the local labor market data. For this month and next, or until the recalculation is complete, what we lack is a clear comparative of this year’s data to prior years, so we’re on a bit of a hiatus for looking at trends for recovery or decline.

That all noted, for a bit more commentary on the monthly numbers, please read on. For the link to the monthly numbers published by our friends at LMID click here.

Industry Jobs: In addition to the decline in jobs already referenced above, in Retail Trade and Leisure & Hospitality (comprised of Accommodation & Food Services, Arts & Entertainment), Ventura County also shed jobs in several other industry sectors in January.

In total, we had a decline by 3,900 Nonfarm jobs, offset by a gain of 400 in Farm.

Among the job losers were:

Mining, Financial Activities and Local Public Education had no change.

The only major sector besides Farm that gained jobs was Private Education & Health Services, up by 300.

As noted above, we anticipated the drop in Retail and Leisure & Hospitality, based on seasonal patterns. The drop in Construction was also expected, given the rains we had in January (which seems now like a lifetime ago). What’s disturbing, however, is the decline in nearly all other sectors, none of them much subject to seasonality. Hopefully that doesn’t turn into a trend, a reversal of recovery.

Unemployment Rate in the Statewide Context: For a nice shot of good news—and a bit of a surprise—looking at statewide standing, Ventura County gained five slots, improving from 19th to 14th among California’s 58 counties. What that means, at least on in-state comparatives, is that our January losses were not as severe as for the state as a whole. California declined from 4.8% in December to 5.5% in January, while Ventura County had a comparatively milder decline from 4.2% to 4.7%. We also had a better January than the nation as a whole, which had a steeper loss, from 3.7% in December to 4.4% in January. At least for this month, we’re closing the gap with the nation as a whole.

Unemployment rates by county are variously displayed in the state’s mapping resources. For the table display on January unemployment rates for all counties, go here.

Questions, comments, please let us know, bruce@edcollaborative.com.