A networking and hiring event for professionals of color in Minneapolis, Minnesota.
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Black men lost ground in the workforce last month, marking a continuation of the disparities that have permeated the U.S. labor market.
Black males who were at least 20 years old saw an unemployment rate of 5.3% in January, up from 4.6% in December, according to seasonally adjusted data released Friday from the U.S. Department of Labor. These workers had the highest unemployment rate when breaking down Black, Hispanic and white workers by gender.
By comparison, white men saw a jobless rate of just 3.3% in January, holding steady from December. The overall unemployment rate was unchanged from December at 3.7%.
Meanwhile, the Black community as a whole was the only tracked racial group to see unemployment increase from December. This underscores the effect of job losses among Black men, especially considering the fact that the rate for Black women was unchanged between December and January at 4.8%.
Though the uptick in the unemployment rate for Black men is something to monitor, it can be more indicative of an anomaly in December’s low data, said Elise Gould, senior economist at the Economic Policy Institute. January’s 5.3% rate comes basically in line with the average 2023 month, while December’s 4.6% was the lowest level seen in the year.
The tight labor market experienced during the Covid-19 pandemic helped close the gap in work-related opportunities among Black and white men, she said. Indeed, the difference in unemployment rates between Black and white men shrunk to 2 percentage points in January from 4.1 percentage points in the same month in 2019.
Growth in the total number of employed Black men and the ratio of those with jobs to the total population compared with the start of 2023 also paints a picture of improvement, she added.
But Gould said the continued inequity in employment and pay highlights the need for further social progress, while bolstering…
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