Editing El Centro, California (section)

===During the late-2000s recession===
According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, as of April 30, 2009, the El Centro area had a 25.0% unemployment rate, the highest for a Metropolitan Area in the country.<ref>{{Cite web|title=Best and Worst Markets to Find a Job|url=http://msn.careerbuilder.com/Article/MSN-1706-Job-Search-25-Best-and-Worst-Markets-to-Find-a-Job/?sc_extcmp=JS_1706_home1&SiteId=cbmsnhp41706&ArticleID=1706&GT1=35000&cbRecursionCnt=1&cbsid=4a4e6f5f5bdf4da8a20875a56172f434-278850886-R5-4|publisher=CareerBuilder.com|date=October 31, 2008|access-date=November 1, 2008|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110708120626/http://msn.careerbuilder.com/Article/MSN-1706-Job-Search-25-Best-and-Worst-Markets-to-Find-a-Job/?sc_extcmp=JS_1706_home1&SiteId=cbmsnhp41706&ArticleID=1706&GT1=35000&cbRecursionCnt=1&cbsid=4a4e6f5f5bdf4da8a20875a56172f434-278850886-R5-4|archive-date=July 8, 2011|url-status=dead}}</ref> By August of that year, El Centro's unemployment rate was 27.5%, three times the overall United States unemployment rate of 9.7%. ''The Economist'' stated that the city is not the "centre<!--The Economist is British, so please keep this spelling--> of the Great Recession" like the figure would appear to indicate. While El Centro has a seasonal farming economy, there is still a fixed "baseline" unemployment at 12%. Timothy Kelly, the head of the Imperial Valley Economic Development Corporation, estimated that between 40,000 and 60,000 residents of [[Mexicali]] work in El Centro. ''The Economist'' added that there are likely many El Centro residents who work in Mexicali and collect unemployment benefits in El Centro; Ruben Duran, the city manager of El Centro, said that if the Mexicali jobs were factored into the employment rate, El Centro would have a normal employment rate. The manager of a job search agency called One Stop, said that about 3,000 people per month come into her agency; she says that some make a genuine effort to find jobs, while many do not have motivation to actually find a job, but to instead show proof that they tried to find a job. Kelly stated that unemployment fraud does not account for all of the issues with the El Centro area; he said that many residents have a lack of education and a lack of English language proficiency, so some of them cannot find jobs. ''The Economist'' added that the collapse of the housing market eliminated some construction jobs; the magazine countered that the scenario is true in many places in the United States.<ref name="Economist"/> In December 2008 listed as No. 5 on Forbes.com's list of "The Top 10 Places in America Where Homes are Losing their Value Fastest" with 31.4% of homeowners owing more on their mortgages than their homes are worth.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.forbes.com/2008/11/11/homes-equity-lifestyle-forbeslife-cx_mw_1112realestate_slide_7.html?thisSpeed=30000|title=In Depth: Where U.S. Homeowners Are Losing Value Fastest|last=Woolsey|first=Matt|date=December 12, 2008|work=Forbes|access-date=July 13, 2009|archive-date=August 11, 2009|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090811042911/http://www.forbes.com/2008/11/11/homes-equity-lifestyle-forbeslife-cx_mw_1112realestate_slide_7.html?thisSpeed=30000|url-status=live}}</ref> A national report on the effects of the "Great recession" of 2008/09 has found El Centro and the Imperial Valley in the top 5 poorest medium-sized cities in the U.S. in poverty and unemployment rates.<ref>{{Cite web|last=Zumbrun|first=Joshua|date=October 21, 2009|title=America's most impoverished cities|url=http://realestate.yahoo.com/promo/americas-most-impoverished-cities.html|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20091025190924/http://realestate.yahoo.com/promo/americas-most-impoverished-cities.html|archive-date=October 25, 2009|access-date=September 27, 2021|work=Forbes|via=Yahoo! Real Estate}}</ref>