East Bay Loses 4,000 Jobs in September

The month of September was not kind to The East Bay as 4,000 jobs were lost, causing a setback to the region’s economy that also halted a three month span of job gains as described by state employment officials. Solyndra, the solar panel manufacturer, has been named as a reason for the job loss ever since the company collapsed. Economists also stated that job losses in the local government, health care, and other industries also attributed to the decline in jobs.

“The economy in the East Bay is really diversified, and normally that’s a good thing,” said Jeffrey Michael, director of the Stockton-based Business Forecasting Center at the University of the Pacific. “But in this recession, it means you get hit more ways than anyone else.”

“This recession has really hit the East Bay hard,” Michael said. “Housing, the mortgage industry, NUMMI and Solyndra. It’s been one thing after another.”

The California Employment Development Department stated that there were 11,800 jobs added during the month of September for the state. The seasonally adjusted figures for the East Bay area show that there were actually 1,800 jobs gained. The jobless rate in the East Bay rose to 10.2 percent, which is an improvement over the 10.4 percent in August, with the number being adjusted for seasonal employment. The California jobless rate was 12.1 in August before it fell to 11.9 percent in September.

There were 1,100 jobs eliminated at Solyndra, based in Fremont, in the month of September. Economists claim that there were more widespread job problems across the state in California during the month of September and that it just was not Solyndra contributing to the problem.

“Solyndra is the main part of what’s going on in the East Bay,” said Michael Bernick, a San Francisco research fellow with the Milken Institute. “But we also continue to see a decline in local government jobs.”

According to seasonally adjusted statistics provided by Beacon Economics, quite a few industries lost at least 1,000 jobs during the month of September. Those areas and numbers are listed below:

• Health care lost 1,800 jobs.
• Manufacturing lost 1,500 jobs.
• Repair, personal, laundry, parking and other miscellaneous services lost 1,500 jobs.
• Local government lost 1,300 jobs.

The East Bay’s best industry in September was retail, where 1,600 jobs were gained. Two major supermarkets, Safeway and Fresh & Easy, have also been hiring new employees. The finance and insurance and administrative services industries both added 900 jobs each in September.

“I’ve been looking for three months and it’s very difficult to find work now,” said Linda Lopez, a Newark resident. “I’m very stressed out. Employers want more experience, but they don’t want to give me the chance to gain any experience. You need to have two to five years of experience.”