2026-2030 Economic Development Strategic Plan

• Growing Workforce:

Riverside County is characterized by a young, diverse labor pool, with 35% of the population under age 25 4 , supported by UC Riverside, a top-tier research university known for advancing economic mobility and labor education, CSU San Bernardino, CSU San Marcos (Temecula), California Baptist University, Loma Linda University, University of Redlands, La Sierra University, Chapman University, UMass Global, and a robust community college network. The CJF analysis underscores the need for continued improvements to Inland SoCal’s educational and workforce development capacities. Overall, the region’s educational attainment is comparatively low, lagging both state and national high school diploma and bachelor’s degree rates by nearly 10 percent. The region has been addressing this fundamental challenge through a range of interventions for more than a decade, with some progress, yet this differential is still recognized as a major factor constraining Inland SoCal’s economic competitiveness and mobility. On average, Inland SoCal workers have 82.9 percent of the knowledge, skills, and abilities that quality jobs in the region require (see sidebar for discussion on quality/ promising jobs). The amount of overlap between the knowledge, skills, and abilities that workers have and what quality jobs require is different depending on how much education a worker has. Workers with a four-year college degree have the highest amount of overlap (91.5 percent). This indicates that they possess nearly all the skills and qualifications that employers seek in high-quality jobs. But even those workers with only a high school diploma or G.E.D. have a high degree of overlap (88.1 percent). These findings suggest that focused training programs with wraparound supports that address key barriers to participation (e.g., childcare, transportation, affordability concerns) could help more Inland SoCal workers, including those with lower levels of formal education, secure a quality job 5 .

What is a quality job?

The Inland SoCal CJF Plan uses a method called Opportunity Industries analysis, which was developed by the Brookings Institution to identify industries likely to create large numbers of quality jobs.

According to the Opportunity Industries definition, a quality job must:

Pay enough over the course of a year to cover a family’s basic needs and leave some extra money left over for emergencies and savings Include health insurance (which tends to mean that the job offers other benefits as well) Provide a level of financial stability over the next ten years (either by continuing to be a quality job or by providing a path to a different quality job). The Opportunity Industries analysis also considers “promising jobs – positions that don’t meet all three of these criteria but can still help a worker move into a quality job within a decade." Attention to promising jobs reflects the fact that many entry-level positions do not meet the definition of a quality job but can play an important role in helping workers gain the skills and experience they need to advance in their careers. Quality jobs and promising jobs together are referred to as “opportunity jobs.”

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