{"id":203664,"date":"2026-03-04T09:20:09","date_gmt":"2026-03-04T09:20:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/203664\/"},"modified":"2026-03-04T09:20:09","modified_gmt":"2026-03-04T09:20:09","slug":"californias-economy-growing-faster-than-the-nation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/203664\/","title":{"rendered":"California&#8217;s economy growing faster than the nation"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/timesofsandiego.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/SpaceX-Factory.jpg?ssl=1\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\"><img loading=\"lazy\" data-recalc-dims=\"1\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"780\" height=\"502\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/SpaceX-Factory.jpg\" alt=\"Rockets under construction\" class=\"wp-image-370982\"  \/><\/a>Rockets under construction at the SpaceX factory in Hawthorne. (Photo courtesy of SpaceX)<\/p>\n<p>The latest <a href=\"https:\/\/www.anderson.ucla.edu\/about\/centers\/ucla-anderson-forecast\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">UCLA Anderson Forecast<\/a> finds the California economy is growing faster than the nation, though this hasn\u2019t been reflected in new hiring.<\/p>\n<p>The forecast released early Wednesday estimates California\u2019s fourth-quarter growth at 3.8% annualized, well above the initial 1.4% U.S. GDP estimate. <\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe state has now grown faster than the nation for four consecutive quarters,\u201d the UCLA economists noted.<\/p>\n<p>However, payroll employment declined in 2025, marking the first sustained contraction since the pandemic. The unemployment rate has remained above 5% for nearly two years, and as of December stood at 5.5%.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cNormally, one would expect employment to grow in step with output and income; however, the opposite has occurred,\u201d the economists said.<\/p>\n<p>The forecast identified the cause as a \u201cnew bifurcated economy,\u201d driven by AI, aerospace and other high-productivity sectors on one side, with slower-growing sectors such as construction, retail and segments of leisure and hospitality on the other. <\/p>\n<p>One reason for this, according to the forecast, is that California gets the lion\u2019s share of venture capital, with nearly 70% of U.S. venture funding flowing to California in early 2026.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIn California, the central challenge remains translating high-productivity sector gains into broader-based employment growth,\u201d the economists said.<\/p>\n<p>Nevertheless, there are \u201cencouraging signs\u201d of hiring in aerospace and computer sectors, while port activity and air cargo volumes are rebounding above pre-pandemic levels<\/p>\n<p>The forecast calls for California unemployment to peak at 5.6% this year, then fall to 4.8% in 2027 and 4.4% in 2028.<\/p>\n<p>The UCLA Anderson Forecast is one of the nation\u2019s most widely watched economic outlooks and was among the first to declare the COVID-19 recession in March 2020.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Rockets under construction at the SpaceX factory in Hawthorne. (Photo courtesy of SpaceX) The latest UCLA Anderson Forecast&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":203665,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[2007,7,9,8,383,45672,13895,16614],"class_list":["post-203664","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-california","tag-ai","tag-california","tag-california-headlines","tag-california-news","tag-economy","tag-ucla-anderson-forecast","tag-unemployment","tag-venture-capital"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/203664","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=203664"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/203664\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/203665"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=203664"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=203664"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=203664"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}