Disneyland Resort in Anaheim remains OC’s largest employer, even as it shed roughly 100 local salaried workers in the area.
It announced the layoffs, which impacted a variety of teams across Disneyland Resort, on Oct. 28.
Officials said that they increased hiring to accommodate reopening following the pandemic, and now that business has normalized, they are adjusting.
“With our business in a period of steady, sustained operation, we are recalibrating our organization to ensure we continue to deliver exceptional experiences for our guests, while positioning Disneyland Resort for the future,” a Disneyland spokesperson told the Business Journal. “As part of this, we’ve made the difficult decision to eliminate a limited number of salaried positions.”
Disneyland reported having 36,000 OC employees as of Sept. 30, prior to the layoffs.
Overall employment increased 1.6% to 232,871 among the 38 largest employers surveyed by the Business Journal. Companywide, they employed 3.3 million, a 1.2% increase from a year ago.
A majority of the companies grew headcount locally with just 11 experiencing decreases.
The rankings include Business Journal estimates for The Boeing Co., Six Flags Entertainment Corp., Irvine Co., Capital Group, Wells Fargo & Co. and AbbVie Inc.
No. 2 Employer UCI
The No. 2 ranked employer, University of California, Irvine, rose nearly 1% to 34,300.
This figure is expected to increase next year once UCI Health’s new 144-bed, all-electric acute care hospital opens on Dec. 10. The hospital is expected to have 970 employees once fully staffed, according to a spokesperson.
The slim headcount increase follows double-digit growth in 2024, when UCI jumped 31% to 34,085 after it acquired four community hospitals and opened acute and ambulatory care and cancer care centers, adding some 6,000 people.
Another healthcare entity in Orange County, MemorialCare in Fountain Valley, grew by 7.2% to 6,782, ranking No. 9 on the list.
“With demand for healthcare services continuing to rise across our hospitals and outpatient facilities, we have strategically expanded our workforce to ensure patients receive timely, compassionate, and high-quality care,” Moses Aguirre, vice president of talent management at MemorialCare, told the Business Journal.
Aguirre said that, looking ahead to 2026, they anticipate “continued, measured growth.”
Largest Increase at Parker Aerospace
Parker Aerospace saw the largest increase on the list with headcount soaring 47% to 1,839.
The growth was primarily due to Parker’s acquisition in 2022 of Meggitt plc. Parker last year completed the integration of Meggitt’s OC divisions, according to Vice President Barry Draskovich.
“Across the board the aerospace industry has been very healthy and accelerating over the last year,” Draskovich told the Business Journal in August.
Right now, it’s gearing up to help equip the next generation of single-aisle Boeing and Airbus jetliners that will replace the current 737 and A320 series.
Elsewhere in Orange County, No. 21-ranked San Juan Capistrano-based Quest Diagnostics, the largest medical diagnostics and testing company in the region, reported having 2,500 employees, unchanged from a year ago.
In recent years, Quest has hired more people in lab and scientific roles in response to increased demand for its services, said Mark Machulcz, president of the west region.
“Going forward, we are hopeful that Quest will continue to be a source of high-quality jobs for the OC community,” Machulcz told the Business Journal.
The company’s website showed 90 available job listings as of Nov. 20.
Research Director Desmond Celo contributed to this report.
