News and Articles

Hispanics losing wages, jobs during housing slump

Published June 5, 2008

The slump in the construction industry has hit Hispanics especially hard, causing "a dramatic reversal" in their economic gains as more become jobless while wages continue to drop, according to a study of labor statistics released today.

The Pew Hispanic Center, a non-partisan research group in Washington, D.C., found that the jobless rate for Hispanics rose to 6.5 percent during the first quarter of 2008. That's compared to 4.7 percent unemployment rate for the rest of the country's population.

The national study found that Latinos were hurt by the same housing and construction boom that is credited with helping them improve their earnings and employment levels.

"We are all in the middle of an economic slowdown, the first since 2003, but this slowdown is having a much harder impact on Hispanic workers," said study author Rakesh Kochhar.

"Hispanics had virtually closed the unemployment rate gap they had" as compared to non-Hispanics, said Kochhar. "And that gain has been entirely wiped out in the last year." Activists and church leaders in Central Florida's immigrant communities have already taken notice of Hispanics' economic struggles. Many have moved to other parts of the country or their countries of origin in search of better job opportunities.

Sergio Padilla, a construction contractor, said he has lost his major source of income over the last year. There just isn't enough work installing cabinets, air conditioning units or floor tiles. He has had to spend his savings to get by during the slowdown.

"This has affected many people I know and they are going off to other states to try to find work," said Padilla, a resident of southeast Orlando. "It's as if every construction project had stopped, and the little that remains is taken by those who had been here for a long time."