David Leonhardt writes in the NYTimes about the recession and the loss of jobs:

If the Great Recession, as some have called it, has a capital city, it is El Centro, Calif., due east of San Diego, in the desert of California's Inland Valley. El Centro has the highest unemployment rate in the nation, a depressionlike 22.6 percent.

Click here for the fascinating interactive map.

Is saying Los Angeles has a 9.5% unemployment rate misleading? If you make your nut on gigs and freelance assignments - you don't show up in these statistics. Is the LA unemployment rate higher?