Hiring ramps up in April
By Ryan Carter, Staff Writer© Pasadena Star-News, May 7, 2010
SAN GABRIEL VALLEY - Employers hired last month at a level not seen in four years, as the economy added 290,000 jobs, the government said.
Job gains came in manufacturing, professional and business services, health care and leisure and hospitality, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
It was enough for President Barack Obama to celebrate after months of gradual upticks in hiring, at best.
"These numbers are particularly heartening when you consider where we were a year ago, with an economy in freefall," he said. "At the height of the downturn, around the time that I took office, we were losing an average of 750,000 jobs per month."
While 66,000 of those jobs were temporary Census workers, the hiring left over represented a solid improvement in the private sector, Obama and economists said. It's one that should continue, some said.
"It should gradually increase above that...we should be adding more jobs than that as the recovery takes hold nationally," said John Husing, who specializes in the Inland Empire.
With the uptick in hiring came a surge in the number of unemployed people getting back into the job search after months of finding nothing. Since the labor market was larger, the national unemployment rate rose slightly to 9.9 percent.
"There's definitely a buzz going on right now," said Cara Eichorn, an unemployed former supervisor for Countrywide Financial, when the now-defunct firm had an office in Pasadena.
Eichorn, who runs job-networking sessions at Pasadena-based job resource center Women at Work, said she's been seeing many of her peers find work recently.
"More of my compadres who I've been networking with have landed, and they've been for a hodgepodge of industries," she said.
Eichorn herself said she's been on more interviews recently.
On the employer side, Gary Kaplan, president of Gary Kaplan & Associates, an executive search firm in Pasadena, was also encouraged.
His firm, which recruits executives for companies and nonprofit organizations, said he's seen an 82 percent increase in new recruiting assignments, which have come from both nonprofit and corporate sectors.
"We've seen a steady stream of assignments in the corporate sector, and that to me is very encouraging," Kaplan said. "The job stats released today seemed to coincide with what we're experiencing."
Locally, unemployment remained high, though April's numbers have not come out. In some cities, unemployment has topped 15 percent. Still, there have been signs of an improving economy.
Camping giant Coleman merged with Pomona-based spa-maker LMS Inc. to create a line of spas that officials say could create more than 200 jobs.
Local food distributors are also expanding.
And in recent months, Industry has seen auto dealers coming back to once-vacant lots in its auto mall.
Jack Kyser, founding economist of the Economic Development Corp., noted that many companies are still cautious about the economy and strapped by inability to get financing. They are not willing to hire full-time, he said.
Still, he was encouraged by the numbers.
"It's still a pretty solid number," he said. "Any growth is good news."
