The U.S. has a history of marginalizing Black people. Marginalization impedes Black Americans’ ability to secure wealth, education, and meaningful work. The Psychology of Working Theory (PWT) uses a social justice lens to understand how contextual factors inform the labor market experiences of those who work and want to work. PWT highlights the ways economic constraints and marginalization predict access to decent work. We tested the PWT model with two measures of marginalization, general ethnic discrimination, and racial microaggressions, with a sample of 241 Black workers to add to the extant literature about the suitability of the PWT for racial minorities. Diverging from previous studies, we found that marginalization predicted career adaptability. Consistent with previous studies, marginalization and economic constraints predicted Black workers’ work volition and perceived access to decent work. Work volition mediated the relationship between general ethnic discrimination and economic constraints with the perception of attaining decent work.

Previous work crises have shown that un-/under-employment can have detrimental mental health effects. Workers facing issues related to employment and decent work now have the added stress of physical harm from the respiratory disease known as COVID-19. This situation presents workers with threats to financial security, physical health, and mental health. However, the presence of coping skills such as perceived social support, resilience, self-esteem, and social class could have a protective effect on mental health outcomes. The aim of this descriptive study was to examine how conditions during a pandemic affect underemployed and unemployed workers' mental health and psychological well-being. Data (n = 200 un-/under-employed adults) were examined to understand the relationship between decent work and mental health symptoms, as well as the effect of coping skills, resilience, self-esteem, social class, and social support. Decent work was related to mental health symptoms in the expected directions. The examination of differences between unemployed and underemployed workers on measures of social support, resilience, self-esteem, economic constraints, social prestige and measures of mental health symptoms, found differences in workers' perception of economic constraints, self-esteem, and social prestige, as well as levels of stress, anxiety, and depression. Underemployed workers reported lower perceptions of their social status, more economic constraints, and higher levels of depression, anxiety, and stress. Lastly, examination of the impact of prior mental health issues, found that workers' who reported no prior diagnosis differed significantly from those with two or more diagnoses on measures of self-esteem, resilience, and social support.