Stagnation would be troubling enough. But because revisions are reported only in aggregate, we don’t know which groups bore the brunt of those cuts. Intersectional analysis fills that gap—and what it reveals about Black women’s employment should alarm us all.
By contrast, since February alone, 879,000 men have entered the labor force. That divergence makes clear the gap isn’t closing—it’s accelerating. Even as women’s participation remains structurally suppressed, men are re-entering the labor market at scale, reshaping the workforce in ways the topline numbers continue to obscure.
This is not a cyclical slowdown. It is a structural divide. The labor market is being carved up with precision:
This divide threatens the very foundation of America’s economic stability. An economy cannot remain resilient while sidelining its most educated women and breadwinner mothers. It cannot sustain Medicare and Social Security if over one million women are missing from the workforce. It cannot grow while concentrating Black women in the lowest-paid jobs and locking them out of higher-wage industries.
The numbers point to urgent, actionable solutions. Enforce pay and opportunity equity. Rebuild inclusive pipelines into higher-wage sectors like technology, finance, and government. Require the Federal Reserve to account for labor force exits, not just topline unemployment, in its models. And design stimulus not as across-the-board tax cuts but as targeted investment to keep women—and especially Black women—working.
The Exit Economy is here. If policymakers ignore it, Black women will continue to pay the highest price. But the cost won’t stop there. It will ricochet across households, communities, and the national balance sheet—eroding the very prosperity America claims to protect.
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