State unemployment drops in past year

California’s unemployment rate was 8.1 percent last month, unchanged from February and down 9.2 percent in March 2013, a state agency said last week.

Non-agricultural jobs in the state totaled more than 15.3 million last month, a year-to-year addition of 325,100 jobs and an increase of 2.2 percent during that time, according to the state Employment Development Department’s monthly report on job growth.

In the Inland Empire, unemployment remained high – 9.4 percent – but was improving, having dropped one percentage point from where it was one year ago.

To put those numbers in perspective, unemployment in Riverside and San Bernardino counties reached 15 percent during 2010, the height of the recession. Still, the Inland region has the second-highest unemployment rate of any major metropolitan area in the country, trailing only Providence, R.I.

Unlike two to three years ago, a lot of Inland Empire residents who are looking for work are finding jobs, according to the report.

The report is based on data derived from a U.S. survey of 5,500 households. U.S. unemployment remained 6.7 percent in March, which was unchanged from February, according to the report.