Sacramento has biggest job loss of 327 largest U.S. counties in 2010 Q3

Could the employment situation in Sacramento be even worse than we thought?  The 3rd quarter 2010 data from the QCEW (Quarterly Census of Employment and Wages, source: unemployment insurance filings) says yes.  A quote from today's news release from the BLS.

Employment declined in 149 of the large counties from September 2009 to September 2010. Sacramento, Calif., had the largest over-the-year percentage decrease in employment (-3.7 percent) in the nation... San Joaquin, Calif., experienced the second largest employment decrease, followed by Marion, Fla., East Baton Rouge, La., and Pinellas,Fla

Things don't get much better when adding in the other 3 counties in the Sacramento Metro area, as Yolo and El Dorado also posted job losses that were greater than a slight gain in Placer.

The bottom line is that the Sacramento metro lost over 23,000 jobs from Sept 09 to Sept 10 according to the QCEW, more than double the 11,000 decline in the reported by California EDD over the same period. Unlike EDD, the QCEW actually shows significant state government employment declines in Sacramento, in addition to large drops in the financial sector and local governments.  The QCEW data is not sample based and considered more reliable than the EDD monthly reports (but it comes out 6 months later).

As noted in the quote, San Joaquin County was the 2nd worst over this period, but the reported losses were similar to those reported in the EDD reports so it wasn't a surprise and isn't worse than we thought.

To summarize, this new data reaffirms the story that we have been telling for over a year, Sacramento has the worst performing economy in the state, and it may be even worse than originally estimated.