What exactly are “black jobs,” and are they really at risk from the recent immigration surge?
“They’re taking black jobs right now. It could be 18 million, 19 million, even 20 million,” former President Donald Trump said of immigrants’ role in the U.S. economy during a debate on Thursday. “They’re taking black jobs, they’re taking Hispanic jobs, and we haven’t seen it yet, but it’s going to be the worst thing in the history of our country.”
But the available data doesn’t show that immigrants are filling large numbers of roles that should otherwise be filled by American citizens.
And as NAACP CEO Derrick Johnson pointed out, “there are no such things as black jobs or white jobs.”
“These are hardworking Americans who want quality jobs, and that should be the goal of this conversation,” he told NBC News this election cycle. — Researchers have found that black voters are being targeted by political disinformation. — Johnson said it’s important “not to pit communities against each other.”
To be sure, black workers have historically been over-represented in certain sectors, such as government and home health care. But black Americans Black executives are at all levels of employment, including in leadership positions. Eight Fortune 500 companies are led by black executives, the highest number ever, but this percentage remains well below the 14.4% black American population.
Data shows that Black workers have made progress under both the Biden and Trump administrations. Under the Trump administration, the unemployment rate for Black workers fell to 5.3% in September 2019, a record low at the time. It has fallen further under President Joe Biden, reaching a record low of 4.8% in April 2023.
Currently, as the overall U.S. labor market slows, the Black unemployment rate has risen to 6.1%, up from a national low of 3.4% in January 2023. But the employment situation for Black workers is generally better.
The labor force participation rate, another measure of the health of the job market, has also improved among Black workers under Biden, with 64% of the Black U.S. population now in the labor force (employed and unemployed but looking for work), up from a peak of 63.2% under Trump.
As the overall economy slowed, the unemployment rate fell to 62.9%, roughly the same level as it was during most of the Trump administration.
Labor force participation rates for black workers are at an all-time high, as are the overall U.S. workforce. — It began during the Clinton administration and has since declined, mainly due to the retirement of the baby boomer generation.
In May, the White House released a report outlining gains made by black workers over the past three years, concluding that an overall stronger labor market had “benefited middle-class and working-class Americans, especially black Americans.”
As viewers of the debate digested Trump’s remarks, some expressed confusion and criticized the moderator for not pushing back. Former Atlanta Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms joked in an X post, “I have a law degree. Does that get me a #blackjob?”
Sherron Perry Thomas, a Pennsylvania voter watching the debate as part of an NBC News focus group, said Trump’s “vocabulary is very limited” when it comes to talking about black workers. “We’re a very diverse people.”
Another black Pennsylvanian, who spoke anonymously to NBC News freely, said he would likely support Biden but was “tired of the way both of them talk about the black community.”
“In fairness, Trump has done positive things for the black community and is now strategic enough to appeal to black voters,” he said, but added that he feels Biden has a better record.
Recent improvements in the fortunes of Black workers have been uneven. Black workers are more likely to be union members than any other racial or ethnic group, for example. But despite Biden’s longstanding support for unions, union membership has fallen to a record low under his administration, from 10.8% in 2020 to 10%.
In terms of wages, inflation-adjusted weekly earnings for Black workers reached a 20-year high of $314 under the Trump administration, and rose slightly to $315 in the fourth quarter of 2023 under the Biden administration. But amid persistent inflation and a cooling job market, average weekly earnings for Black workers fell to $293 in the most recent quarter.
As for whether immigrants are generally “stealing” jobs from U.S.-born workers, the data suggests they’re not. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the unemployment rate for U.S.-born citizens remains near record lows, at 3.8% in May, lower than the U.S. overall unemployment rate of 4%. Their unemployment rate is unlikely to be as low if immigrants were displacing U.S.-born workers.
While Trump may have been pointing out the over-representation of black workers in low-wage jobs, experts say newly arrived immigrants, regardless of race, tend to be hired in sectors such as construction, food service and agriculture that would likely go unfilled by native-born workers.
“It is clear that the labor market is absorbing immigrants and creating strong job opportunities for U.S.-born workers, including those demographics most vulnerable to immigration,” the Economic Policy Institute, a progressive think tank, said earlier this year.
Seth Anderson-Oberman, a Pennsylvania voter who watched the debate, found the discussion of jobs unpleasant.
He accused them of “constantly exploiting division to pit people against each other — black and brown people, immigrants, people who struggle to provide for themselves and their families.”
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