Jobs Still Scarce for Many New Yorkers

Despite the lowest unemployment rate in five years, New York City’s labor market is far from fully recovered from the recent recession.  Many groups are still suffering from high rates of unemployment.

Overall, the city’s unemployment rate fell to 5.9 percent in 2005, a notable improvement from the 2003 rate of 8.5 percent.  But much of the job growth over the last two years has been in low-wage industries.  The expansion has spurred employment gains, especially for less educated men, but the increased demand for these workers has not been strong enough to generate wage increases that can keep pace with the rising rate of inflation.

These are some of the findings in a recent labor market report released by the Community Service Society, "Unemployment and Joblessness in New York City, 2005: Decline in Unemployment Rate Masks Areas of Continued Weakness" (PDF).

The report compares a number of factors in the job situation in 2005 to 2000, before the recession and the effects of 9/11 hit the city.  Even with a recent boost in the local economy, a smaller share of the city’s working age population was employed in 2005 than in 2000, 63.5 percent compared to 65.1 percent.  A larger proportion of the unemployed were jobless for more than 26 weeks in 2005 (34.0 percent) than in 2000 (23.8 percent), the period for which they are no longer eligible for Unemployment Insurance benefits.

In addition, real weekly earnings for workers at the middle and lower rungs of the wage ladder were down by 1.9 percent and 3.6 percent, respectively.  Much of the decline in inflation-adjusted wages occurred in the last two years, when employment was growing mainly in low-wage industries.

Some Gains

While overall employment is still below 2000 levels, employment has started to rebound in the past two years.  From 2003 to 2005, the share of working age New Yorkers holding a job rose from 61.4 percent to 63.5 percent.

Men experienced greater gains in employment than women, with black men showing the greatest increase in jobholding over the two-year period, from 51.8 percent to 63.1 percent.  This is related to the growth in the wholesale and retail trade, health care, and professional business services, where many men with no more than a high school education found employment.

While many groups that were hurt the most by the recession saw an increase in jobholding over the past two years, their unemployment rates remained high.  These include teenagers (16.9 percent unemployed), young adults (11.2 percent), blacks (8.7 percent), Hispanics (7.0 percent), and people with less than a high school degree (7.3 percent).

Taking Action

There are several actions that city and state officials can take to increase job opportunities for these groups.  In the coming years, there will be a number of large construction projects in the city.  These will bring billions of dollars and thousands of jobs to the construction industry.  We will need to decide which workers will benefit from the job and training opportunities that will be created.

A partial response is the Mayor’s Commission on Construction Opportunity, which was created to ensure that all New Yorkers, especially people of color and new high school graduates, can gain access to good construction jobs.  The construction unions have agreed to commit specific percentages of apprenticeship slots targeting demographic groups.  The city will create a new high school dedicated to engineering and building trades curriculums.

City leaders must press state legislators to remove legal barriers facing formerly incarcerated New Yorkers.  For example, people with a felony record cannot get a barber’s or plumber’s license.  What’s the reasoning behind these types of laws?  The state must remove these unwarranted – and self-defeating – barriers to jobs for people with criminal records.

Much job growth
is low-wage

In addition, the City Council, in direct response to our research on black male joblessness, allocated $10 million for a New York Works job training program for the chronically unemployed last year and another $18 million in its latest budget.  The Council should continue to press for an expansion and continued funding of this program.

The city and state should establish a second chance system for New Yorkers with the greatest barriers to steady employment, such as the formerly incarcerated and the huge numbers of high school dropouts.  This should include programs for returning to school and job training and apprenticeships in cooperation with a variety of industries.

City and state leaders must voice their opposition to the cuts in job training and vocational education programs contained in President Bush’s latest budget request.  They should coordinate their efforts with the state’s congressional delegation and representatives from other states which have been particularly hard hit by unemployment.

From the New York Amsterdam News
April 6 - 12, 2006