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Washington, D.C. (June 23, 2022) – A new Center for Immigration Studies analysis of employment shows that while the overall unemployment rate for immigrants and the U.S.-born has returned to pre-pandemic levels, this obscures the low labor force participation rate of the U.S.-born, particularly those without a bachelor’s degree.
The "unemployed" includes only those who have actively looked for a job in the prior four weeks, while labor force participation measures the share of all working-age people holding a job or actively looking for one. If the labor force participation rate for these less-educated Americans were the same in 2022 as it was 2000, seven million more people would be in the labor force.
“The low unemployment rate is largely meaningless because it does not include all the people on the sidelines,” said Steven Camarota, the Center’s director of research and co-author of the analysis. “With more than 54 million working-age people not in the labor force, we need to adopt policies that get more people back into jobs — not perpetuate the situation by bringing in ever more foreign workers.”
Among the findings:
- The unemployment rate of about 4 percent for both the U.S.-born and immigrants (ages 16-plus) in the first quarter of 2022 is similar to what it was before Covid-19, as is the total number (6.7 million) unemployed.
- Perhaps more important than the 6.7 million unemployed are the 54.5 million working-wage (16-64) U.S. residents not in the labor force — neither working nor looking for work
- Of all 61.2 million not working in the first quarter, 35.3 million (58 percent) were U.S.-born adults (18-64) without a bachelor’s degree.
- Among the U.S.-born, labor force participation is lowest and has tended to decline the most among the least-educated — dropouts and those with only a high school education, though it has also declined among those adults with some college.
Prime-age (25-54):
- Focusing only on “prime-age” (25-54) men, who traditionally have the highest labor force participation, shows a large decline for the U.S.-born, but not so much for immigrants.
- Of U.S.-born men of prime working age without a bachelor’s degree, only 84 percent were in the labor force in the first quarter of 2022, compared to 89 percent in 2000. In contrast, 91 percent of less-educated prime-age immigrant men were in the labor force in 2022, compared to 92 percent in 2000.
- Like their male counterparts, the labor force participation rate of less-educated U.S.-born women of prime age has declined — from 77 percent in 2000 to 72 percent in 2022. At 62 percent, the labor force participation rate for immigrant women is lower than their U.S.-born counterparts, but has not changed much since 2000
Race:
- While less-educated U.S.-born blacks tend to have lower rates of labor force participation than U.S.-born whites and Hispanics, all three groups show a decline over the last two decades.
- Among prime working-age U.S.-born Americans (25-54) without a bachelor’s degree, labor force participation between 2000 and 2022 declined for whites from 84 percent to 79 percent; for blacks it declined from 79 percent to 75 percent; and for Hispanics it declined from 81 percent to 78 percent.
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