CA's Economy Outpaces Nation's For Fourth Straight Year, State Says

Once again, the Golden State's economy is going strong. That's according to the California State Board of Equalization, who reported this week that the state's gross domestic product outpaced the growth of the nation's GDP for the fourth straight year. While the national GDP rose by 3.7 percent in 2015, California's GDP increased by 5.6 percent.

According to the BOE, the GDP — which is also referred to as the "economic output" — measures the market value of goods, services, and structures that are produced within a particular period, and tends to be related to population, income, spending, employment, housing permits, and other measures of economic activity. The percentage values of increase the agency provided were unadjusted for inflation.

"According to the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis, the New York-Newark-Jersey City metropolitan area led the nation with an economic output of about $1.603 trillion in 2015," the BOE reported. "California was represented by two of the top 10 areas: Los Angeles-Long Beach-Anaheim ($930.8 billion), and San Francisco-Oakland-Hayward ($431.7 billion). The Los Angeles metropolitan area accounts for 37.9 percent of California’s GDP, while the San Francisco Bay Area comprises 17.6 percent."

As for the fastest growing metropolitan area in California, that honor lies with San Jose. San Jose also boasted stronger economic growth than 380 of the nation’s 382 metropolitan areas in 2015, the BOE said.

"Once again San Jose was among the fastest growing regions economically, not just in California, but in the U.S as well," said Board of Equalization Member Fiona Ma. "I am so proud to represent businesses in the Silicon Valley, San Francisco, Oakland, and Santa Rosa – which all saw growth that was higher than the state average."

For more, check out the Board of Equalization’s Economic Perspective for March 2017.