UCLA forecast: CA unemployment to continue dropping

LOS ANGELES (KABC) -- A UCLA economic forecast released on Wednesday had encouraging news about California's unemployment, which is dropping faster than the national unemployment.

California saw a surprising increase in jobs in September and October, state unemployment dropped from 12.1 to 11.7 percent, raising hope that the state is crawling out of its economic doldrums.

But the slow economy across the rest of the country may keep California's recovery from picking up steam.

In the Los Angeles-Long Beach area, unemployment is 11.1, while in the Riverside-San Bernardino area, unemployment is 13.3 percent.

"The employment numbers continue to be encouraging, but the trade numbers do not reflect a robust recovery," UCLA Anderson School of Management senior economist Jerry Nickelsburg wrote in his quarterly forecast.

The report predicted that the state's economy will show slow growth through 2012, and that the unemployment rate will gradually drop over the next several quarters.

City News Service contributed to this report.

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