RI Employment Market Dismal for Women & Minorities

The employment market in Rhode Island has been disproportionately adverse to women and minorities, according to data released today by the nonpartisan Rhode Island Center for Freedom and Prosperity, in conjunction with the Liberty Foundation.

While the overall labor participation rate declined for the entire state by 2.4 percentage points from 2010 through 2013 to 65.3%, the decline among certain minority demographic groups in Rhode Island was considerably worse.

• Women in RI experienced a drop of 3.6 points to 60.1%
• Blacks/African Americans suffered a whopping drop of 8.1 points to 65.4%
• Hispanics bore a significant drop of 5.9 points to 66.3%

Meanwhile, men saw a one-point decline over this same period.

"It is obvious that the tax and spend policies implemented by our elected officials have failed our state and have been especially harmful to the very same people many of these spending programs were intended to help," said Mike Stenhouse, CEO for the Center. "A new, pro-jobs public policy culture is sorely needed if we're to help the tens of thousands of Ocean Staters who are unemployed or who have quit looking for work."

With a general election scheduled for early November, the Center advises voters to think hard about whether or not to re-elect incumbent legislators and whether or not to approve a Constitutional Convention that would give the people of Rhode Island a more prominent voice in how their government operates. "The time is now to move away from the special interest politics that have crippled our state," added Stenhouse.

A one-page chart summarizing Rhode Island's labor market decline over the past 15 years, as well as a highly detailed demographic breakdown over this same period, along with other related information, can be found on the Center's website at RIFreedom.org/jobs.

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