To nearly 18.6 million available workers
But for the third straight month, the state unemployment rate remained flat at 7.4%, according to Employment Development Department data released Friday. That's higher than the national rate, which edged lower last month to 6.1% from 6.2% in July.
The job recovery in California, however, has more momentum than in the nation as a whole.
This time last year, 8.9% of workers in the state were unemployed. Now, more Californians are streaming back into the labor force, which expanded by 16,400 people last month to nearly 18.6 million available workers.
But employers are hiring enough to absorb the expanding pool of workers, which contributed to the stagnant unemployment rate, economists said. Some 17.2 million Californians had jobs in August, up by 16,000 from July. But the number of unemployed workers was also up, rising by 1,000 to nearly 1.4 million total.
"If we want this to go down, the job creation has to pick up more than it is now," said Esmael Adibi, director of the A. Gary Anderson Center for Economic Research at Chapman University.
At a job fair hosted earlier this week by Citadel Outlets in Commerce, job seekers milled about in the intense heat. Many leaned against store windows to fill out applications or positioned themselves near entryways spewing out cool air.
Rafael Moreno, 38, huddled with an application on a bench near Old Navy. The East Los Angeles resident — wearing a collared shirt, striped tie and slacks — was laid off from his insurance agent job in April. He's losing hope that he'll land an office job in clerical work or administration.