Pasadena unemployment rate on the grow

Pasadena's June unemployment numbers hit 5.3 percent, the highest in the city since 2004. The rate has climbed almost a full point over the last two months... before that the city had been keeping its unemployment slightly above where it was last year. In June of 2007 the unemployment rate was 3.7 percent. About 1,000 fewer jobs are available in the city than this time last year.

Of course, Pasadena is in the same boat as everyone else in the county (and still a lot better off than many other cities). Things have been especially bad in the San Gabriel Valley: SGVN reporter Ben Baeder reported last week that the number of San Gabriel Valley jobs dropped 2.2 percent in 2007, even as county wide jobs increased 0.5 percent. And that is before the worst of the economic downturn: unemployment is rising fast in 2008.

However, things could yet get worse for the Crown City: June's numbers don't include the IndyMac layoffs that happened earlier this month.

Also, as I mentioned in a post last week, city property values are finally starting to drop off like everyone else's: until June, home values were still fairly stable.

I'll be turning out a more detailed print version of these latest economic woes later this week.