Every first Friday of every month is when the U.S. Department of Labor drops a monthly employment report and, despite all the articles and analysis of these numbers, dropped in the different media channels in the country, the fundamental is often lost: behind those numbers are real people. Among these, tens of millions are Latinos/Hispanics, a group that increasingly presents itself as the engine of the US workforce. 

According to data presented on the Department of Labor Blog, among the top five facts about the Latino workforce in the country, the number of Latino workers grew from 10.7 million in 1990 to 29 million in 2020, and is expected to reach 35.9 million in 2030. Furthermore, “Hispanics are projected to account for 78% of net new workers between 2020 and 2030”.

These data are important in analyzing the growth rate of the country's overall workforce over the past two decades. According to the blog, the growth of the non-Latin workforce in the same period was only 0.5%. If we consider the growth of Hispanic workers, the overall growth rate of the workforce in the country reached 4.5%. According to a study by McKinsey & Company after two years of pandemic and its financial implications, “the Hispanic and Latino population growth means the country’s long-term recovery is inextricable from the recovery of Hispanic and Latino families, communities, and businesses. Indeed, the community’s unique assets—such as its relative youth and above-average rates of entrepreneurship—can contribute to more equitable postpandemic recovery and growth”.

Thus, Latinos or Hispanics are not only aggregators of the workforce, but also creators of new businesses and job promoters. The recent report from the Stanford Graduate School of Business found out that “Latinos are important job creators, growing their number of employees at a faster rate than White-owned employer businesses”. […] The number of Latino-owned employer firms has grown 35% in the last 10 years compared to 4.5% among White-owned businesses, with job growth outpacing growth in the number of new businesses. The number of employees at LOBs has grown 55% since 2007, compared to 8% job growth among WOBs”.

According to Stanford research, there are between 400,000 - 450,000 Latino-owned businesses employing more than 2.9 million people. These companies have an average of 8 employees, constituting an important and growing source of employment in the United States. “This year’s [2021] research finds that Latino business owners are more likely to provide opportunities for the growth and advancement of their employees than White business owners”.

It is important to note that despite these findings, the COVID-19 pandemic has negatively impacted Latino-owned small and medium-sized businesses, along with the rest of the US economy. According to the McKinsey and Company study, about 50% of these companies’ revenue “is in the hardest-hit sectors, including leisure and hospitality, retail trade, and construction. Since Hispanic- and Latino-owned businesses are disproportionately small and already more likely to be at risk or distressed […].”  

According to The Hill publication, the fact that Latino companies have become the biggest generators of jobs, even in the context of economic difficulties, is due to Latino resilience. “One example of this resilience is Peinado Construction in Frisco, Texas. Teddy Peinado started his construction company 13 years ago, since then they’ve designed and constructed more than 50 million square feet of commercial buildings. The construction industry got hit hard during the pandemic, but Peinado didn’t buckle. With the shift to working from home and the growth in e-commerce, the demand for industrial warehousing in 2021 increased 54 percent above 2020, a demand Peinado was prepared to fulfill. They did even more business in 2021 than they did in 2020, raising their project

t volume from $468 million to $919 million, that’s a 96 percent year over year growth. And in January of 2021, their main office had 64 employees. Today, they have 84. Peinado Construction created 20 new jobs during a time when businesses struggled to remain afloat”.

While twenty jobs may not seem like a huge number, according to the publication, small and medium-sized employers make a big difference in their communities.

Among some differentials pointed out by the Stanford survey, Latino-owned companies were more likely to report positive results in their businesses, which are reflected in the application of business strategies considered proactive. It is worth checking all data.