, Columnist
Los Angeles Is a Drag
California’s biggest metropolitan area is beset by slow job growth. The rest of the state is plugging along.
The weather is better than the economy.
Photographer: Patrick T. Fallon/BloombergThis article is for subscribers only.
Among the nation’s 12 biggest metropolitan areas, it is metro Los Angeles — comprised of Los Angeles and Orange counties — that has seen the slowest job growth over the 12 months ending in July, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
As one can see from the above chart, job growth in California’s second biggest metropolitan area, San Francisco, also isn’t setting any records at 1.6 percent, which happens to be the national average. The state’s third most populous metropolitan area, San Diego, posted job growth of 1.5 percent.4