Black unemployment has dropped to 5.0 % in March, the lowest record since the data-collection began in the 1970s, the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) said on Friday.
The BLS which began gathering data in the 1970s released its latest report on Friday. This is the first time Black unemployment has dropped down to 5%. The White House hails the news as “an incredible milestone.”
While there still remains a considerable gap between the unemployment number between Black and White people, the narrowing of the gap is still being touted as a major victory. The white unemployment rate is at 3.2 %.
Hailing it as an incredible milestone, Bharat Ramamurti, Deputy Director of the White House National Economic Council said new figures are proof that the Biden Administration’s efforts to address “historic, systemic issues that existed in the labor market” are bearing fruit.
“President [Joe Biden] and Vice President [Kamala Harris], from the moment, that they came into office, identified that they not only wanted to have a strong economic recovery, they wanted to have an equitable recovery,” Ramamurti explained.
Ramamurti claimed that the Biden Administration improved what was an “inequitable” Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) under the Trump administration.
“The folks who were not well connected to a bank, a big bank or otherwise, often didn’t get some of that PPP money or other small business relief,” he said.
The American Rescue Plan, the Deputy Director claimed, helped bring down the Black unemployment rate with direct economic relief throughout the COVID-19 pandemic.
“That also had a big impact in terms of the opportunities and hiring that those types of entities were able to do,” said Ramamurti.
