How Economic Forces and Racial Inequity Shape Opportunity and Mobility 

by Jacob Gottlieb, IEDC Intern 

Urban Institute hosted a webinar titled How Economic Forces and Racial Inequity Shape Opportunity and Mobility that focuses on Urban’s new workforce development initiative, WorkRise. The webinar included opening remarks from Urban Institute President Sarah Rosen Wartell, Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation President Allan Golston, and Mastercard Center for Inclusive Growth Chairman Michael Froman. After opening statements, the discussion shifted to two panels focusing on economic trends impacting opportunity and policies and practices that have upheld structural racism in the labor market.

What is WorkRise? 

To start, Ms. Rosen Wartell explained how WorkRise will be a new national platform for identifying, testing, and sharing big ideas for transforming the labor market. Current labor market stressors and transformations have created a moment of reckoning with systemic racism, for instance, the awareness that many essential workers are people of color. Many different strategies are being used across the country and across multiple levels of government to address these issues. WorkRise intends to support research on these efforts to discover best practices and support research in rapidly changing labor market trends by investing $7 million in research grants over the next three years.

How Systemic Racism Plays Out in Labor Markets

During the first panel, leading economists from across the political spectrum discussed the economic forces and trends that have diminished opportunities for advancement and economic mobility. 

The first panel emphasized how interconnected economic mobility and economic inequality are. Middle and low-wage workers, who are disproportionately racial minorities and women, have not fully realized the benefits of economic growth in the United States in recent decades, primarily because wages have not kept up with economic growth. This has led to many families struggling to save money to buy homes, obtain higher education, invest, and participate in other activities that are important for economic advancement. 

Opportunities for economic mobility are only going to get harder to access given how difficult finding new work will be for the millions of American workers displaced during the pandemic and because of advancements in automation. The pandemic has also restricted opportunities for economic mobility for those who lack access to services like childcare, healthcare, and internet. 

How to address? 

During the second panel, speakers discussed policies and practices that have perpetuated racial disparities in the labor market and considered what it takes to create more racially just outcomes for workers. Barriers to opportunity are often treated as a result of individual failure rather than consequences of the long history of discriminatory practices such as occupational segregation, mass incarceration, discrimination in hiring and promotion, and the weakening of other forms of worker protections. 

Potential solutions identified by the panel to address racial disparities in the labor market include raising the federal minimum wage, supporting worker unionization efforts, expanding unemployment insurance, expanded access to the internet, and, specifically in response to the pandemic, providing more stimulus benefits. Additionally, upskilling and life-long learning efforts focused on digital skills and fluency are going to be essential to making sure workers are satisfying the needs of the labor market. All of these policies are expected to produce meaningful economic benefits for Black, Indigenous, and people of color in the labor market, increasing access to opportunities for economic mobility.