The state's economy is halfway through a recession that won't begin easing until sometime next year, according to the latest forecast from the University of the Pacific.
Projections from UCLA's economists are also gloomy. Forecaster Jerry Nickelsburg said statewide unemployment will stay above 7 percent through all of 2009.
"We can expect doldrums to be the operative word describing the California economy over the next 18 to 24 months," he wrote in the latest UCLA Anderson Forecast, which is to be released today.
The two quarterly forecasts come a week after the Employment Development Department reported that California unemployment last month rose to 7.7 percent, and Sacramento's rose to 7.4 percent. Both are the highest since 1996.
Jeff Michael, director of the UOP Business Forecasting Center, said the state is in a recession that's "shallow, but long." Job loss won't end in California until mid-2009.
The construction industry alone will lose another 50,000 jobs before bottoming out at the end of 2009, he predicted. The industry has lost about 130,000 jobs in the past two years.
The only major economic sector expected to add jobs in California next year is health care, he wrote.
Some hard-hit sectors should start rebounding within a year. Michael said motor-vehicle sales in California "should post solid gains in 2009."
Sacramento's job market should start perking up in the third quarter of next year. Job growth should hit a fairly robust 1.8 percent in 2010. At that point unemployment should fall back below 7 percent.
Call The Bee's Dale Kasler, (916) 321-1066.
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