Race In The Workplace
By Bryan Hancock, Monne Williams, James Manyika, Lareina Yee, and Jackie Wong. The research in this report was conducted in collaboration with Walmart, the W.K. Kellogg Foundation, PolicyLink, and McKinsey’s Institute for Black Economic Mobility.
This report explores Black workers in the private sector in three parts: first, their participation in the entire US private-sector economy; second, their representation, advancement, and experience in companies; and third, a path forward that includes the key challenges to address, actions companies can take, and additional actions for a wider set of stakeholders to accelerate progress on diversity, equity, and inclusion (DE&I).
In the United States, Black workers account for 15 million, or 12 percent, of the 125 million US private-sector workers.1 The overall Black labor force, including the entire private sector, public sector, and the unemployed looking for work is 20.6 million.2 Our analysis of economic data, primarily drawn from the Bureau of Labor Statistics and the US Census Bureau from 2019,3 as well as the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission from 2018, reinforces the immense complexity of the challenge facing many of the Black private-sector workers today.
