CA unemployment rate fell to 6.9 percent in January; employers added 67,300 jobs

California’s unemployment rate fell to 6.9 percent in January, and the state's employers added 67,300, according to the state Employment Development Department.  

California’s unemployment rate has now fallen below seven percent for the first time since mid- 2008, when the recession was starting.   Economist Robert Kleinhenz with the Los Angeles County Economic Development Corporation says the state lost a bigger share of its jobs during the recession than the U.S. did.

"We did fall deeper into recession than the U.S. as a whole," says Kleinhenz. "So the noteworthy thing is when we turned things around, we actually grew at a faster rate than the U.S."

That faster growth continues now, says Kleinhenz.  The construction sector is one of the main drivers. Comparing January 2015 to the same month last year, the sector added 37,800 jobs, a growth rate of 5.7 percent. 

Twenty-nine year old construction engineer Jordan Kath remembers when his industry took a beating during the recession.  Back then, he remodeled homes for a small-scale general contractor. 

"A lot of these contractors were just trying to stay afloat," Kath recalls. "There wasn’t always work every day."

So he decided to go back to school and earned a Construction Engineering Management degree from Cal-State Long Beach.  In 2013, he landed an internship with Turner Construction, which is building the Wilshire Grand project in downtown LA. When he finished his degree last May, that internship turned into a permanent job.

"According to plan, the economy came up right as I was graduating, so the timing was perfect," Kath says.  

In Los Angeles County, the unemployment rate dropped to 7.9 percent in January, down from 8.8 percent a year earlier.  Between January 2014 and January 2015, the county gained 98,200 jobs.