L.A. unemployment down a bit

It’s kind of a watching-paint-dry report, with July joblessness falling to 4.8 percent from 4.9 percent in June. Statewide, the rate was 5.3 percent, up from 5.2 percent in June. One interesting nugget: construction employment was virtually unchanged in July, and over the last 12 months it has declined by only 3,000 jobs. How could that be happening in a homebuilding slump? The conventional explanation is that L.A. County has lots of big projects in progress, but there's probably more to it than that. What the official numbers don't tell you are how many off-the-books construction jobs have been lost in the last year or two. The speculation is that it's a bunch, though as with any aspect of L.A.'s underground economy, your guess is as good as mine. By the way, L.A. County employment has grown at an annual rate of 0.9 percent, which is well under what the forecasts had called for. (Business Journal)