HBCU Money

Overall Unemployment: 6.7% (6.7%)

African America Unemployment: 12.4% (12.0%)

Latino America Unemployment: 7.9% (8.1%)

European America Unemployment: 5.8% (5.8%)

Asian America Unemployment: 5.4% (6.0%)

Previous month in parentheses.

Analysis: Overall the unemployment rate went unchanged. Asian and Latino America both saw declines in their unemployment rates of 60 and 20 basis points, respectively. European America went unchanged. African America saw an increase of 40 basis points and remains the only group with double digit unemployment rate.

African American Male Unemployment: 12.1% (12.9%)

African American Female Unemployment: 11.0% (9.9%)

African American Teenage Unemployment: 36.1% (32.4%)

African American Male Participation: 67.0% (66.6%)

African American Female Participation: 62.0% (61.9%)

African American Teenage Participation: 25.6% (24.9%)

Previous month in parentheses.

Analysis: African American male unemployment saw a decline of 80 basis points, but females and teenagers both saw significant increases of 110 and 370 basis points, respectively. Participation rates for all three groups saw increases in their participation rates.

Conclusion: The overall economy added 192 000 jobs. An increase of 17 000 over February’s numbers, but still short of the majority of economist estimates. A sluggish effect from the winter storms appears to be still dragging. African America added 21 000 jobs for March. The number of employed African Americans and participation rate is at its highest in the past five months. African America’s labor force is at its highest number in the past five months, but so is the number of unemployed. Both of these factors have a significant factor on increasing the unemployment rate. There is renewed optimism for African American job seekers, but it would take an increase of 462 000 new jobs just for African America to get its unemployment rate under 10 percent at the current labor force numbers. An amount well over 100 percent above what the entire country is currently producing. This is also the smallest number of jobs African America has added in the past five months so even though most of the marks looks good, it appears to be more like the best sweater in an ugly sweater party.