The partial government shutdown is impacting Black federal workers the hardest, according to a report by 11 Alive News. The government shutdown is now in its fourth week.
Studies show that Black workers in the public and private sectors traditionally don’t save enough money to pay their bills if they lose their jobs or are furloughed.
Black workers make up about 10.5% of the civilian workforce and 18.4 percent of federal workers, according to 11 Alive.
President Donald Trump warned Congress that the partial government shutdown could last for months or even a year if they don’t approve his request for $5.7 billion to build a wall at the southern border.
After the passage of the Civil Rights Act, the government hired more Black workers, offering decent pay and job security. Since then the government has had a higher percentage of Black workers than the private sector.
The government shutdown is impacting those Black workers who were living from paycheck to paycheck before the shutdown.
According to the Census Bureau, Black families have a fraction of the wealth of white families. For every $100 earned by a white family, Black families earn only $6, according to 11 Alive.
“Blacks and Latinos have far less wealth, which means in a crisis, you don’t even have the savings to dip into which will put people in a more precarious situation,” Emory political science professor Andra Gillispie tells 11 Alive.
Gillispie added that Black government contractors and other minority businesses that bid on government contracts likely won’t recover the monetary loss after the shutdown ends.
She tells 11 Alive the shutdown could discourage Black workers from seeking employment with the government in the future.
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