Special The Truth
State of the Dream 2026: From Regression to Signs of a Black Recession is the product of a collaborative effort drawing on the expertise of Joint Center staff, fellows, and trusted external partners. Contributors include colleagues from United for a Fair Economy, the Center for Economic Policy Research, the National Community Reinvestment Coalition, and the Onyx Impact Group. This report stands on a powerful foundation laid more than two decades ago by United for a Fair Economy (UFE).
State of the Dream 2026 Takeaways
- Employment and Unemployment: By December of 2025 Black unemployment increased to 7.5 percent from 6.2 percent in January of 2025. The November 2025 unemployment data for Black youth showed dramatic fluctuations, going from 18.6 percent in September to 29.8 percent in November and then back at 18.3 percent in December. If Black people had the same prime-age employment rate in 2025 that they had in 2024, then there would have been about 260,000 more prime-age Black people working. Of this number, about 200,000 would have been prime-age Black women.
- Black Federal Employment: The elimination of 271,000 federal jobs has likely had a severe impact on Black workers, who are disproportionately represented in the federal workforce, as reflected in the sharp rise in Black unemployment in 2025.
- Tax Policy: The One Big Beautiful Bill Act of 2025 entrenched permanent tax cuts for high-income and high-wealth households and corporations, reduced investment in poverty-alleviating programs, and left support for working families stagnant or diminished. Rather than expanding direct support for struggling households, policymakers made permanent the extended 2017 tax rate cuts, preserved business tax preferences, including Section 199A of the Internal Revenue Code and bonus depreciation, and maintained estate tax and capital gains benefits that flow overwhelmingly to wealthy households.
- Entrepreneurship: President Trump’s executive orders, including EO 14151 and EO 14173, have shifted federal support away from disadvantaged businesses, threatening an estimated $10 billion to $15 billion in lost federal support for Black-owned firms while simultaneously defunding the U.S. Treasury Department’s Community Development Financial Institution Fund and moving to dismantle the Minority Business Development Agency, the only federal agency dedicated to minority business development.
- Financial Deregulation and Digital Assets: The dismantling of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau and the uneven, largely untested shift in cryptocurrency and other digital asset regulations have left Black communities disproportionately vulnerable to predatory fees, discriminatory lending, and financial fraud, while shifting the burden of protection to states, researchers, and community institutions that cannot fully replace federal enforcement.
- Broadband Policy: The Trump administration’s turning away from equity scoring, the cancellation of the Digital Equity Act, the removal of mobile hotspot and school bus Wi-Fi connectivity from E-Rate eligibility, and weakened broadband pricing transparency requirements undermine the structural supports designed to broaden access and adoption and could reduce the number of Black households with internet access.
- Social Media Policy: While federal social media policy has remained largely unchanged, the most significant developments in the online information ecosystem have come from platform-driven policy changes where social media platforms have pulled back on fact-checking and censorship.
- Artificial Intelligence: President Trump, through his executive order, Removing Barriers to American Leadership in Artificial Intelligence,i shifted away from precautionary regulation toward a more deregulatory, innovation-driven posture. The rescission marks a sharp departure from the prior focus on civil rights, transparency, and safety in federal AI policy.
- Workforce Policy and Black America: The transformation of increasing apprenticeships while cutting programs that advance African American workforce participation sets the stage for reinforcing racial inequality rather than bridging it.
- Housing Policy: The near 30 percent disparity in homeownership between Black and white people has been consistent for generations. The latest U.S. Census Bureau data reports Black homeownership at 45 percent and white homeownership at 74 percent.