”Survey says” looks at various rankings and scorecards judging geographic locations while noting these grades are best seen as a mix of artful interpretation and data.

Buzz: Southern California workers are enjoying faster job growth and rising wages compared with their peers elsewhere in the state.

Source: My trusty spreadsheet reviewed one of my favorite job numbers — a quarterly tally of hiring and pay stats from employer records. This data is far more accurate than the monthly survey data we frequently discuss.

Unfortunately, these quarterly calculations take time to complete. So this employment analysis for the four counties covered by the Southern California News Group is based on the latest data for the year ending in March.

Topline

Southern California bosses added 540,550 workers in the 12 months ended in March to boost total staffing to 7.7 million —  that’s 7.5% growth. The rest of the state had 729,700 hires to 10 million —  just 4.3% growth.

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Meanwhile, Southern California’s average weekly wages rose 4% to $1,397 a week. Pay dipped in the rest of California by 0.6% to $1,834 a week.

Details

This year’s hiring boost partially reflects California’s slower-than-average employment rebound in early 2021. So bosses statewide have been playing catch-up of late — especially in consumer-facing businesses such as tourism, dining, entertainment and retail.

However, these jobs typically have some of the market’s lowest wages. It may sound like statistical semantics, but the rapid rehiring statewide of these more modest-paying positions helped depress the average wage.

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Across Southern California, job and pay growth was significant in the 12 months ended in March …

Riverside County: 9% more jobs to 810,500 and a 3.9% wage increase to $1,034.

Los Angeles County: 7.7% more jobs to 4.46 million and a 3.7% wage increase to $1,487.

San Bernardino County: 6.8% more jobs to 829,900 and a 5.3% wage increase to $1,053.

Orange County: 6.7% more jobs to 1.61 million and a 4.3% wage increase to $1,510.

Bottom line

The 7.5% job growth in the four counties also exceeded the rest of the U.S. The nation, minus California, had 5.8 million hires in the past year to 130 million or 6.1% growth.

However, Southern California’s 4% wage growth trailed the other states with 7.5% wage increases hitting $1,337 weekly.

Jonathan Lansner is the business columnist for the Southern California News Group. He can be reached at [email protected]