Gender, Race, and Ethnicity in the American Labor Force
Jarrad Poond
2025-05-22
U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics Portfolio Piece
This data analysis portfolio piece pulls information from U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) databases that include economic statistics on inflation, prices, unemployment, and pay & benefits. We explore the available data to attain a view and understanding of the gender, race, and ethnicity breakdown in the U.S. Labor Force. This is a relatively new data set that the BLS started collecting in 2020. Let’s look at a summary of the data in this portfolio piece.
Data Sources
Our data source is the U.S. Inflation and Unemployment dataset from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.
These data were accessed via BigQuery public datasets.
Gender
Proportion of Women in the American Labor Force
The diagram below presents the percentage of women workers within each Sector of the American economy between 2020 and 2023. The error bars represent the standard error across sub-sectors. Between 2020 and 2023, the average proportion of people identifying as women in the United states is estimated to be around 50.5% (noted in red the diagram below).
Below we have the same information presented in a condensed, interactive table, and the Sectors are listed in order of descending percentage of women workers in that sector.
Discussion
Compared to this national proportion of women in the U.S., we see a significantly higher proportion of women represented in the Education and health services sector, with 74.2% of these workers identifying as women. We then see a cluster of seven (7) sectors (Leisure and hospitality; Professional and business services; Other services; Public administration; Financial activities; Wholesale and retail trade; Information) where women compromise between 40% and 50% of the workforce, lower than the overall population percentage but higher than the remaining four (4) sectors, where the percentage of women is below 30%, with the lowest percentage of women being in the Mining, quarrying, and oil and gas extraction sector.
Race
Proportion of Black or African American Workers in the American Labor Force
The diagram below presents the percentage of Black or African American workers within each Sector of the American economy between 2020 and 2023. The error bars represent the standard error across sub-sectors. Between 2020 and 2023, the average proportion of people identifying as Black or African American in the United states is estimated to be around 13.7% (noted in red the diagram below).
Below we have the same information presented in a condensed, interactive table, and the Sectors are listed in order of descending percentage of Black or African Americans workers in that sector.
Discussion
Black or African American workers are present at a higher than expected rates in the Transportation and utilities (17.4%), Public administration (17.2%), & Education and health services (16.4%) sectors of the American economy. We notice an interesting result, where both women and Black or African American workers are over represented in the Education and health services compared to their national proportion (~13.7%), indicating that Black or African American Women in particular make up a significant foundation of the American education and health systems. We also see two (2) sectors with significant under-representation for Black or African American worker: Agriculture, forestry, fishing, and hunting and Mining, quarrying, and oil and gas extraction. In between the clusters of sectors with significantly higher and significantly lower proportions or Black or African American workers, a cluster of the remainder of the sectors show a grouping where Black or African American workers remain under-represented compared to national proportions, with proportions of Black or African American workers ranging from an average of 9.6% (in the Wholesale and retail trade sector) to an average of 12.2% (in the Financial activities sector).
Proportion of Asian Workers in the American Labor Force
The diagram below presents the percentage of Asian workers within each Sector of the American economy between 2020 and 2023. The error bars represent the standard error across sub-sectors. Between 2020 and 2023, the average proportion of people identifying as Asian in the United states is estimated to be around 6.4% (noted in red the diagram below).
Below we have the same information presented in a condensed, interactive table, and the Sectors are listed in order of descending percentage of Asian workers in that sector.
Discussion
Visible clusters of sectors are not immediately noticeable in the case of Asian workers; however, we do see that Asian workers appear to be statistically over-represented in the Information (10.3%) sector of the American workforce, particularly in the Internet publishing and broadcasting and web search portals, Software publishers, & Data processing, hosting, and related services sub-sectors. Similar to the case of Women workers and Black or African American workers, we see Asian workers are also significantly underrepresented in the Agriculture, forestry, fishing, and hunting sector. Many of the other sectors appear to have proportions of Asian workers in line and within error of the proportion of those identifying as Asian in the American populous, which is around 6.40%.
Ethnicity
Proportion of Hispanic or Latino Workers in the American Labor Force
The diagram below presents the percentage of Hispanic or Latino workers within each Sector of the American economy between 2020 and 2023. The error bars represent the standard error across sub-sectors. Between 2020 and 2023, the average proportion of people identifying as Hispanic or Latino in the United states is estimated to be around 19.5% (noted in red the diagram below).
Below we have the same information presented in a condensed, interactive table, and the Sectors are listed in order of descending percentage of Hispanic or Latino workers in that sector.
Discussion
There are several sectors in which Hispanic or Latino workers appear to be underrepresented compared to the expected national proportion of around 19.5%. These sectors include Manufacturing (18.3%), Wholesale and retail trade (18.0%), Professional and business services (17.6%), Transportation and utilities (16.8%), Mining, quarrying, and oil and gas extraction (15.8%), Financial activities (14.0%), Education and health services (13.8%), Public administration (12.4%), & Information (11.5%). On the other hand, no sector appears to be comprised of more Hispanic or Latino workers than expected compared to the national average proportion of those in America identifying as Hispanic or Latino. The Other Services sector has a 4-year-average of 21.3% Hispanic or Latino workers, but we do not have the statistical power to claim that this is significantly higher than expected. The larger error bars that prevents us from making that determination gives possible evidence of major variation in the percentage of Hispanic or Latino workers across the various industries that span the Other Services sector. Given this results, it is wise to delve deeper in the Industry Groups that make up the Other Services sector to see what insights we can find, if any.
-Looking Deeping into “Other services”
The diagram below presents the break down of the percentage of Hispanic or Latino workers in the three (3) Industry Groups within the Other Services sector.
Within the Other Services sector, we see that Hispanic or Latino workers appear to be present in the Personal and laundry services (21.8%) industry group at a proportion in line and within error of the proportion of those identifying as Hispanic or Latino in the American populous. On the other hands, we see Hispanic or Latino workers statistically over-represented in the Repair and maintenance (26.6%) industry group and statistically underrepresented in the Membership associations and organizations (12.0%). Thus, we see why the error in our approximation of the percentage of Hispanic or Latino workers in the Other Services sector was so large, as this sector contains industries with a relatively wide range in the average proportion of Hispanic or Latino workers.
Summary
In this data analysis portfolio piece, we pull data from a publicly available database using R-Studio, investigate the data to rectify any issues, and analyze/summarize the data into charts and tables that highlight the sectors in which the proportion of different genders, races, and ethnicity are greater or less than expected based on national proportions. Notably, we saw that both Women workers and Black or African American workers are over-represented in the Education and health services sector, with Black or African American worker additionally over-represented in the Transportation and utilities and Public administration sectors. We also see Asian workers over-represented in the Information sector, and Hispanic or Latino workers over-represented in the Repair and maintenance industry group within the Other services Overall, we see Women workers, Hispanic or Latino workers, and non-White workers are underrepresented in the Mining, quarrying, and oil and gas extraction sector. Information like this can be used to identify areas of the workforce where more diversity, equity, and inclusion efforts may need to be implemented in order to provide better access to career paths for particualr identidy groups in America.