Posted on Sat, Oct. 11, 2003 Silicon Valley loses thousands more jobs BUT JOBLESS RATE FALLS AS PEOPLE MOVE OR STOP LOOKING By Margaret Steen Mercury News
Silicon Valley's job market continued to limp along in September. Although Santa Clara County's unemployment rate fell to 7.5 percent from a revised 8 percent in August, the county lost 2,300 jobs during that time.
``I still think it's going to be sometime beyond the end of this year before we see the economy really come to a bottom and level off,'' said Steve Cochrane, senior economist at Economy.com.
Although the decline in the unemployment rate may seem like good news, it was caused largely by people leaving the labor force, either moving out of the county or giving up their search for work. The number of unemployed county residents dropped by 6,400 to 67,800 in September, but the number of employed residents fell as well.
The number of jobs in the county, which economists generally view as a more accurate indicator of the economy's health, continued to fall. The number of jobs in September, 864,800, was the lowest of any month since February 1996.
The figures, which were released Friday by the state Employment Development Department, showed that many of the job losses came in professional and business services, leisure and hospitality, and manufacturing.
Economists said it's not clear how soon the apparent national recovery will translate into more jobs for Silicon Valley. There are mixed signals about a recovery in the tech economy. Investors are expressing some confidence in tech companies, some of which are putting out new products. But others are still struggling; Sun Microsystems recently announced more layoffs, for example.
``I'm certainly expecting a significant recovery next year, but I haven't heard of any evidence that it's happening yet,'' said Richard Carlson, an economist and partner at Spectrum Economics in Mountain View.
Silicon Valley's job situation remains grim compared with that of the rest of the country. In August, the most recent month for which comparisons of large metro areas are available, the San Jose metro area had the second-highest unemployment rate, just behind Portland, Ore., with a rate of 8.1 percent. Miami and New York had the next-highest rates.
``It is still one of worst-performing metro area labor markets,'' Cochrane said. ``I think San Jose is still going to be the laggard for another year or two before we see any kind of catch-up start to take place.''
Statewide, the situation was similar to that in Santa Clara County. California's unemployment rate stood at 6.4 percent, seasonally adjusted, in September. That's down from a revised 6.7 percent in August. For comparison, the U.S. unemployment rate was 6.1 percent in September.
California lost 16,600 jobs from August to September.
There are some anecdotal reports that hiring is picking up locally. But that still isn't translating into jobs for many who are looking.
``It seems like there are at least more real jobs advertised, things that are more suited to me that I'm starting to see,'' said Patty Breslin, 40, of San Leandro. She has been looking for technical support or client services work for more than six months. ``I haven't been able to get more responses to those things, but it seems like there's more offered.''
Market Data 
Markets 
AI
