Black unemployment just rose at its fastest pace since Covid

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Cherry-picking one data point from a monthly economic report is neither fair nor necessarily telling. But one statistic stood out in September’s mostly “meh” jobs report like a sore thumb.

The unemployment rate for Black Americans rose from 6% to 7%, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. It was the fastest one-month increase in Black unemployment since March-April 2020. Outside of the pandemic, it was the highest gain for Black unemployment since 2012.

The rise was even more stark for Black women, whose jobless rate increased to 7.3% in September from 5.9% in August.

It’s an unsettling development, particularly when the unemployment rate for all other races the government tracks — Asian, Hispanic and White Americans — fell between August and September. In other words, the overall increase in the unemployment rate to 4.2% from 4.1% was entirely attributable to the growth in joblessness of Black Americans.

A rise in the Black unemployment rate can sometimes serve as a canary in a coal mine when problems are budding in the labor market. Jobs held by a larger percentage of Black workers than other races, including service-related roles and administrative support positions, tend to be the jobs employers cut first.

The Trump administration, which rarely acknowledges potential economic weak spots, called the sharp rise in Black unemployment worrying.

“It is definitely a cause for concern,” said Kevin Hassett, White House Director of the National Economic Council, in response to a question from CNN’s Alayna Treene. “We’re going to watch closely; we’re going to study it closely.”

One month does not a trend make, and there is some reason to doubt the data.

Hassett suggested some statistical noise could be a contributing factor to the big spike, and several economists supported that notion. The Black unemployment rate is an extraordinarily volatile data point, extrapolated from a relatively small sample of data.

That’s why economists typically don’t draw meaningful conclusions about Black unemployment from one month to the next, focusing instead on several months of data to draw trend lines. And those trends have been quite positive for Black jobs: The unemployment rate had been trending steadily downward from 8.2% in November 2025 to 6% in August 2026.

The Black unemployment rate isn’t unique in its data volatility. The entire jobs report, with its reduced survey response rate — and staff to collect and make sense of the data — has been choppy for quite some time.

“Honestly, it’s too early to tell if this is a canary in the coal mine, especially given how volatile jobs numbers have been in recent months,” said Heather Long, chief economist for Navy Federal Credit Union. “We need to see another month or two of data before calling this a trend.”

A big decline in education jobs in September could have played a significant factor in the unemployment rate spike, particularly for Black women, Long noted. That decline in teachers may have been attributed to a late Labor Day this year and some seasonal adjustments that didn’t quite catch the rebound in teaching jobs after summer ended.

Another potential factor: a significant rebound in the labor force participation rate, after nearly half a million more people were looking for work last month than in August, noted Kory Kantenga, chief economist for LinkedIn. The labor force participation rate and the employment-to-population ratio increased for Black workers.

That could be a sign of a stronger labor market, not a weaker one.

The problem for Black workers: Historically, it takes longer for Black Americans to find jobs than people of other races who are seeking work. And few sectors are hiring in this economy, reducing opportunities for folks who aren’t in healthcare or building data centers.

Nevertheless, as Hassett said, the Black unemployment rate bears watching over the course of the next several months.

The sharp upswing is an indication of the fragility of the “low-hire, low-fire” labor market, noted Sung Won Sohn, a professor of finance and economics at Loyola Marymount University and chief economist of SS Economics.

“Cracks are showing at the edges,” he said, noting that the unemployment rate rising for Black workers is an “early warning sign.”

And the recent AI-fueled changes in the labor force have been particularly unkind to women. Some economists have called 2026 a “momcession,” as 451,000 fewer women are participating in the labor force than at the end of last year — a trend that Jasmine Tucker, vice president of research at National Women’s Law Center, called “alarming.”

“We remain concerned about policies pushing women, particularly Black women, out of the workforce,” she said.

乔·雷德尔/盖蒂图片社

从月度经济报告中断章取义地挑选一个数据点既不公平，也未必能说明问题。但在9月份那份整体表现平平的就业报告中，有一个统计数据却显得格外刺眼。

据美国劳工统计局数据显示，非裔美国人的失业率从6%上升至7%。这是自2020年3月至4月以来非裔美国人失业率单月增幅最大的一次。若不考虑疫情因素，这也是自2012年以来非裔美国人失业率增幅最大的一次。

黑人女性的失业率上升幅度更大，9 月份的失业率从 8 月份的 5.9% 上升至 7.3%。

这是一个令人不安的趋势，尤其是在政府追踪的其他所有种族——亚裔、拉丁裔和白人——的失业率在8月至9月期间均有所下降的情况下。换句话说，整体失业率从4.1%上升至4.2%完全归因于非裔美国人失业率的上升。

黑人失业率的上升有时就像煤矿里的金丝雀，预示着劳动力市场即将出现问题。黑人占比高于其他种族的工作岗位，例如服务业岗位和行政支持岗位，往往是雇主最先裁员的目标。

很少承认经济中存在潜在弱点的特朗普政府称，黑人失业率的急剧上升令人担忧。

白宫国家经济委员会主任凯文·哈塞特在回答CNN记者阿莱娜·特里恩的提问时表示：“这确实令人担忧。我们将密切关注，深入研究。”

一个月的数据不足以形成趋势，而且有理由怀疑这些数据的真实性。

哈塞特认为，一些统计误差可能是导致失业率大幅飙升的因素之一，几位经济学家也支持这一观点。黑人失业率是一个波动性极大的数据点，它是根据相对较小的数据样本推断得出的。

这就是为什么经济学家通常不会仅凭一个月的数据就对黑人失业率得出有意义的结论，而是着重分析几个月的数据来绘制趋势线。而这些趋势对黑人就业来说相当积极：失业率从2025年11月的8.2%稳步下降到2026年8月的6%。

黑人失业率的数据波动并非个例。整个就业报告由于调查回复率降低，以及收集和分析数据所需的人员不足，长期以来一直不稳定。

“老实说，现在判断这是否是煤矿里的金丝雀还为时过早，尤其考虑到近几个月来就业数据波动如此剧烈，”海军联邦信贷联盟首席经济学家希瑟·朗表示。“我们需要再观察一两个月的数据才能将其视为一种趋势。”

朗指出，9月份教育行业就业岗位的大幅下降可能是导致失业率飙升的重要因素，尤其对黑人女性而言更是如此。教师岗位的减少可能与今年劳动节较晚以及一些季节性调整有关，这些调整未能完全反映出夏季结束后教师岗位的反弹。

领英首席经济学家科里·坎滕加指出，另一个潜在因素是劳动力参与率的显著反弹。上个月的求职人数比8月份增加了近50万人。黑人劳动者的劳动力参与率和就业人口比率均有所上升。

这可能表明劳动力市场走强，而不是走弱。

黑人劳动者面临的问题是：历史上，黑人找工作所需的时间比其他种族的人要长。而且，在当前的经济形势下，招聘的行业寥寥无几，这进一步减少了非医疗保健或数据中心建设行业从业者的就业机会。

不过，正如哈塞特所说，未来几个月黑人失业率值得关注。

洛约拉马利蒙特大学金融经济学教授、SS Economics首席经济学家孙成元指出，这种急剧上升表明“低雇佣、低解雇”劳动力市场的脆弱性。

“裂痕正在边缘显现，”他说道，并指出黑人劳动者的失业率上升是一个“早期预警信号”。

而近期人工智能推动的劳动力市场变革对女性尤其不利。一些经济学家将2026年称为“妈妈衰退期”，因为届时参与劳动力市场的女性人数将比去年年底减少45.1万人——全国妇女法律中心研究副总裁贾斯敏·塔克称这一趋势“令人担忧”。

“我们仍然对那些将女性，特别是黑人女性，挤出劳动力市场的政策感到担忧，”她说。