The Bay Area job market was so feeble in 2023 that the region suffered brutal job losses for most of the year before employers mounted a massive hiring rebound in recent months, a new analysis shows.
Instead of adding 62,100 jobs in 2023, the nine-county region eked out a paltry gain of 4,600 jobs last year — or 57,500 fewer than originally calculated. Even worse, over a longer period from October 2022 through August 2023, the Bay Area shed employment in eight out of 11 months for a cumulative loss of 31,400 jobs.
An assessment of employment patterns in the region shows that of the Bay Area’s three major urban centers, the East Bay fared the best in 2023. Here are how the Bay Area’s three major urban centers fared during the first eight months of 2023, and how they snapped back with a hiring boom in the final four months of last year: