Bay Area jobs: growth and big cuts

Bay Area employers added jobs in February even as California lost 19,900 positions statewide, extending a split between local hiring and headline layoffs. (edd.ca.gov) California’s unemployment rate held at 5.4% in February, while the state’s first monthly payroll decline since September 2025 was driven by losses in private education and health services and leisure and hospitality, according to the Employment Development Department. (edd.ca.gov) In the Bay Area’s biggest job centers, the February unemployment rate was 4.2% in the San Jose-Sunnyvale-Santa Clara metro area and 3.8% in the San Francisco-San Mateo-Redwood City division, both below the statewide 5.5% unadjusted rate. (labormarketinfo.edd.ca.gov) That local strength is colliding with another reality in tech: Meta is reported to be planning a 10% workforce reduction in May, or nearly 8,000 jobs, with more cuts later in 2026. NBC Bay Area said the report came from Reuters, and Meta declined comment. (nbcbayarea.com) Meta employed nearly 79,000 people at the end of 2025, according to NBC Bay Area’s earlier reporting on the company’s March cuts, so a 10% reduction would amount to one of the region’s largest single-company layoffs this year. (nbcbayarea.com) The company has already cut hundreds of jobs as it shifts spending away from virtual reality and toward artificial intelligence, including across Facebook and Reality Labs, NBC Bay Area reported in March. (nbcbayarea.com) California’s WARN law generally requires 60 days’ notice for mass layoffs, plant closures, or relocations, and the state posts those filings publicly through the Employment Development Department. (edd.ca.gov) The next statewide and local labor-market update, covering March 2026, is scheduled for May 1, so the Bay Area’s February gains and Meta’s expected May cuts will land in separate snapshots of the same economy. (labormarketinfo.edd.ca.gov)