Black Unemployment Is Surging Again. This Time Is Different.

Joblessness for Black workers is rising again, two years after reaching a record low. It’s a troubling indicator: Joblessness often spikes higher for historically marginalized groups during economic downturns, and takes longer to fall.

This time, the Trump administration’s assault on diversity programs and cuts to the federal work force could make it even more difficult for Black workers to recover when conditions improve.

The African American unemployment rate has surged over the past four months, from 6 to 7.5 percent, while the rate for white people ticked down slightly to 3.7 percent. On top of a slowing economy, the White House’s actions have disproportionately harmed Black workers, economists said.

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At least since the 1970s, when the federal government started tracking unemployment by race, the rate for Black people has run about twice the rate for white people. {snip}

A strong economy during President Trump’s first term created more jobs for Black workers, but many of them were lost when the Covid-19 pandemic hit in-person employment particularly hard. Generous public subsidies, though, cushioned the blow, and hiring rebounded quickly.

In 2023, conditions for Black workers looked as healthy as ever. Unemployment reached a low of 4.8 percent. Wages rose at their fastest pace since data collection began in the 1990s, and median Black household wealth reached the highest level on record.

Conditions started to deteriorate in 2024 after pandemic-era subsidies expired. Hiring slowed, and high prices weighed heavily on low-income earners. Black households were the only racial group last year in which median income fell and the poverty rate rose, according to the Census Bureau.

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Job losses are concentrated among Black women working in professional services such as human resources, according to Ms. Wilson’s analysis of federal data. A hiring freeze and mass layoffs in the federal work force, which have continued during the government shutdown and now exceed 200,000, have also fallen disproportionately on Black workers.

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The federal backlash against diversity, equity and inclusion practices may be making it more difficult for Black workers to get hired in the private sector, too. Some of the strongest evidence for the efficacy of these practices, such as making sure to interview nonwhite candidates or reaching out to Black and Hispanic students, comes from federal contractors. In one of its first actions, the Trump administration ordered that group not to pursue racial equity anymore.

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But Trump administration actions beyond work-force cuts and anti-D.E.I. policies could create additional hurdles for Black workers. The Department of Labor’s proposed rollback of minimum-wage and overtime protections for domestic workers, for example, would hurt their incomes. Home care aides for the elderly are overwhelmingly Black and Hispanic women.

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