by Jeffrey McKinney
May 8, 2025
Latest figures show that joblessness for Black women surged by 106,000 last month.
New eye-popping data shows what is not often cited in the nation’s labor force. Fresh numbers reveal that unemployment for Black workers this year is steadily rising, especially for Black women.
A disturbing trend was identified in the latest information from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS). Among other findings, the report disclosed that the jobless rate for Black women rose to 6.1% in April, a full percentage point surge from 5.1% in March.
In contrast, the unemployment rate for White women in April was 3.3%, unchanged from March, and 4.6% for Hispanic women, the same as in March; women in other groups generally do not face racial and gender discrimination like Black women, a factor in the jobless rate discrepancy.
For perspective, the jump for Black women was among the highest of any group and much greater than the unchanged overall 4.2% nationwide unemployment rate last month. Black women saw their unemployment climb by 106,000 in April.
According to the digital platform HBCU Money, the number of Black women employed is at a five-month low, and the number of unemployed is at a five-month high.
Concurrently, the overall Black unemployment rate rose to 6.3% in April from 6.2% in March, reflecting the third straight monthly rise and the highest surge since January. For Black men, unemployment in April was 5.6%, down from 6.1% in March. The BLS reported that the overall economy added 177,000 jobs in April.
William Michael Cunningham, an economist and owner of Creative Investment Research, told Black Cosmopolitan that the number of unemployed Blacks increased by 29,000, reaching nearly 1.4 million, while the total labor force fell by 7,000.
“The unusual nature of this increase in Black women’s unemployment is a testament to and a direct result of the anti-DEI and anti-Black focus of the new administration’s policies,” he says. ” This is demonstrably damaging to the Black community, something we have not seen before.”
For Black women, Cunningham says the latest numbers show those seeking work are not finding jobs, making gaining employment more difficult for them.
He added that Black women losing DEI roles and federal government jobs, fueled by Trump-led policies, impact them because their joblessness is growing. Those women are also purportedly to account for a larger share of federal employee roles that have fallen in the last three months as the Trump regime has acted to cut the workforce. The BLS report disclosed that federal government employment fell by 9,000 in April and is down by 26,000 since January.
Based on another report, minorities are frequently discharged first from jobs when the economy declines. Andre Perry, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, has stated, “The layoffs at the federal level where Black people are more represented, the impacts of the tariffs, particularly on small businesses that hire Black women, and just the overall use of DEI as a slur, which may be contributing to a lack of hiring of Black women, all of these factors are probably at play.”
Further, Cunningham says less work in sectors like retail and hospitality that generally employ a high number of Black women could also be fueling more joblessness for that group.
“This creates a double whammy for the Black community because the localized economic impact in major cities results in a decline in hotel stays, meals eaten at restaurants, and less business activity in industries heavily populated by Black workers.”
In recent years, scores of Black women have started their own businesses at a brisk pace, with unemployment cited as one of the reasons why. Also, possibly facing larger unemployment rates, Black women have shifted to entrepreneurship to generate their own income, anchor their livelihoods, and use business ownership to gain more career control.
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