Nearly two-thirds of LGBTQ homes have seen job losses this year

A new report found that a majority of LGBTQ households have lost a job since the pandemic began, one of a host of economic problems they’ve faced in the past year.

Last week, the Movement Advancement Project, a which provides research on issues of equality, including nondiscrimination protections for LGBTQ people, released the results from a national poll conducted in July and August.

It found that, since the pandemic began, 64% of people in LGBTQ households had lost employment compared with only 45% of straight and cisgender households. Sixty-four percent of LGBTQ people in households where they or someone else had to leave their home to work in a job outside of the health care industry also said they “had serious concerns about COVID safety” at work, compared to 46% of people in other households.

Additionally, 38% of these households said they hadn’t been able to receive medical care during the pandemic, or had delayed getting that care, versus 19% of cis and straight households.

Queer and trans people have struggled to keep their overall financial picture steady since the beginning of the pandemic: Forty-five percent of LGBTQ households said they used up all or most of their savings and 30% of other households said the same.

The LGBTQ community faced greater rates of poverty and problems accessing health care well before the pandemic.

Groups within the LGBTQ community, such as Black and Latinx queer and trans people, confront even greater economic hardship: 95% percent of Black and 70% of Latinx LGBTQ households said that either they or someone in their household had one or more serious financial problems since the pandemic began compared to 66% of all LGBTQ households.

The latest poll is one of several efforts this year from organizations focused on LGBTQ equality in order to gauge the economic wellbeing of queer and trans people as Americans continue to die of complications from COVID-19. Approximately 318,000 Americans have died from COVID-19 so far.

The Human Rights Campaign and PSB Research released data in May that found more LGBTQ people of color said they asked for delays in rent and had a reduction in work hours than white queer and trans people. In September, those groups also found that LGBTQ people were more likely than straight and cis people to prioritize safety during the pandemic over reopening the economy as soon as possible, despite the greater economic problems they said they faced.

LGBTQ people’s mental health has also suffered, with many reporting that their psychological well-being has been “negatively affected to a moderate or significant degree” in the past year, according to a Center for American Progress survey published in October.

Meanwhile, in the midst of a pandemic, the harm of which Trump has consistently downplayed, the Trump administration has continued to attack LGBTQ equality by releasing rules that encourage discrimination.

Among other things, it has finalized three rules in the final stretch of the administration that harm the rights of LGBTQ workers, asylum seekers, and those who use social services.

Published with permission of The American Independent Foundation.