It’s another Thursday, which means the nation’s employment reports are out, and they show a further 3 million people have filed jobless claims, taking the total on the unemployment rolls north of 36 million Americans. But, just as the coronavirus itself has not affected the general population proportionally, its economic consequences haven't either.
ColorLines has a new post that highlights recent research about the impact the unemployment catastrophe has had by gender and race. Conducted by Forbes, the research concludes that women of color have experienced “disproportionate job losses.” The reasons for these disproportionate losses are the result of numerous factors and historical causes that far predate the pandemic, but have been exacerbated by it.
As ColorLines’s N. Jamiyla Chisholm highlighted, women of color have entered low-wage service work at large levels, and these jobs in restaurants, retail, homecare and other lines of work have been some of the hardest hit by unemployment. Additionally, Chisolm notes that those who remain employed are often in some of the riskiest jobs as far as infection rates go, such as cashiers, warehouse workers, and meat processors all come with low wages and little ability to social distance.
Both Christian Weller, author of the Forbes article, and Chisolm call for better data tracking with more granular information about those impacted by the economic crisis. This can lead to better policies to protect people who were already marginalized and vulnerable to economic crises before coronavirus and who now face profoundly more difficult choices about employment, safety, and the health of their families.
