Economy

As harvest season approached, growers begged county officials to vaccinate their workers. But the state and counties didn’t prioritize vaccine doses for farmworkers in February. So the growers and doctors stepped in and set up their own clinics.

The COVID-19 pandemic has accelerated job displacement and unemployment trends — precipitated by advancements in technology and automation. Although these disruptive forces impacting the workforce are not new, they do exacerbate long standing social inequities embedded in our pre-COVID economic landscape. CalMatters and the Milken Institute hosted a discussion to reimagine traditional economic development approaches that prioritize diversity […]

Unable to meet state COVID-19 infection criteria, Merced and Inyo counties still can’t reopen most businesses. The status threatens a big Memorial Day event in Bishop, so the town has asked the state to reconsider its rural county requirements.

The state’s unemployment agency has signed $236 million in private contracts as jobless workers await benefits. EDD says it needs the outside help.

Lea este artículo en español. Long before he watched the windup to the first pitch, even before he entered the Oakland Coliseum, Sergio Santillan of Hayward was already feeling emotional. “I kinda wanna cry. I’m just loving it,” he said, beer in hand, perched on a cement divider in the parking lot. Last year would have […]

The state went deep into debt to keep jobless benefits flowing during the pandemic. And if it doesn’t fix its $48 billion unemployment problem, that could derail COVID-19 recovery.

On March 19, 2020 Gov. Gavin Newsom announced a statewide shelter-in-place order. In response to an unprecedented public health threat, it was an equally unprecedented shuttering of day-to-day life. “This is not a permanent state,” Newsom assured us at the time. “This is a moment in time. And we will meet this moment together.” On […]

The latest CalMatters video offers a quick explanation of how California’s unemployment system went awry while struggling to confront unprecedented demand. As the pandemic left millions of Californians unemployed, prosecutors say scammers found many ways to defraud the state. The confusion derailed the unemployment system and left many people out of work to fend for […]

State officials announce that outdoor sports and live performance venues, as well as amusement parks, will be allowed to begin reopening on April 1 — with restrictions.

As the state reshuffles vaccine distribution and reopening rules, lawmakers green-light a hard-fought plan to bring students back into schools. What does it all mean for economic recovery?