The growing U.S. economy and improving business environment is bringing black workers back into the labor force, BET founder Robert Johnson told CNBC on Friday.

Johnson, the nation’s first black billionaire, spoke before Friday’s jobs report, which showed nonfarm payrolls rose 103,000 in March, falling well short of the 193,000 gain economist were expecting.

In January, the Labor Department reported the unemployment rate among black workers was at its lowest since at least the early 1970s, when the government began tracking the data. The unemployment rate for black Americans spiked in January and then fell in February. The rate was unchanged in March at 6.9 percent.

“When you look at that [January report], you have to say something is going right,” said Johnson, a Democrat and founder and chairman of The RLJ Cos.