Unemployment for Blacks In America is CHRONIC with no end to our condition in sight.

For those new to the blog, please read my other posts by searching under 'buy black'.  

When you have a chronic disease, you learn to live in pain, and find creative ways of coping. It is only when your condition flares up, that you really have to focus on it, otherwise you begin to go through life living with your dehabilitation as if life is normal. 

This approach is commendable and shows great resilence and a tremendous will and power to adapt to difficult and challenging circumstances. However, when your chronic condition has a cure and you are simply unaware that you don't have to live a confined and restricted life then your chronic condition is troubling at best.

BLOG OVERVIEW

In this blog, I will show you that our unemployment rate is chronic in America and that Dr. Martin Luther King in his book' " Where do we go from here, Chaos or Community", written in the 1960's was correct when he said that we had twice the unemployment of whites because those figures depsite all of our progress HAVE NOT CHANGED over the past 40 years!

From the U.S. labor statistics we find over the last decade blacks lowest unemployment rate was 8.4% and when that occurred nobody spoke of a bad economy or lack of jobs because it was a time when America was booming! Whites unemployment at the same time was 4%. However, when whites experience anything over 8 such as 2009 and 2010, they actually hit a high of 9.3, not one percentage point higher than blacks lowest, now all of sudden we here an outcry for jobs because the unemployment rate is so high.

Note: I actually went back and found the statistics of the 70's, 80's, and 90's and it has not changed. The statitics I found go all the way back to 1972.

Our math is skewed and flawed because we tend to spout off America's unemployment  rates and live life as if we are fully integrated into America's system not realizing that the majority of our race is not. Even those of us who are doing well as corporate citizens are being paid far less than we are worth.

If America is at 11% unemployment, the reality is that is an average of all of America. That includes, rural, urban, farmers, factory towns,  etc. and all races. The question is not what is America's rate in as much as what is your employment rate. That would be like living on a street where 11% of the houses are on fire and you saying that is an acceptable number when your house is in that 11%!  Blacks in america are now at 17% unemployment.

The chronic unemployment experienced by African-Americans is a by-product of vicious cycles that must be changed. Malcolm X explained the cycle this way. He said that if you grow up in a poor (disadvantaged) community then you would attend a sub standard school and receive a poor education. A poor education then leads to limited job opportunities (low wages). If your wages are low then you will not be able to afford to move out of a poor neighborhood and therefore your children will also attend a sub standard school and the cycle repeats all over again.

So what if you actually do succeed in breaking the cycle then what happens to those people, which I imagine is the majority of people who read blogs like mine.

EVIDENCE OF BIAS IN AMERICA

Well, evidence is now emerging that reveals a true bias in America in the wages paid to blacks versus whites as well as in hiring practices for jobs. In an article written in 2003 in Bloomsberg Newsweek on Economics we find this:

When blacks' résumés get a colder reception than whites', it's not always because of active discrimination. It's often a subconscious decision -- what Chicago's Bertrand calls a "rational reaction." That is, the legacy of lagging economic performance by blacks causes an employer to infer that a black applicant will be less productive. This creates a vicious cycle in which discrimination doesn't go away until after blacks have managed to succeed in spite of it.

Black managers and executives are also getting paid less than whites in similar jobs. A new study, based on government data from 1999 to 2002, by William M. Rodgers III, associate professor of economics at the College of William & Mary, shows that black male executives and managers earn 23% less than white ones. Rodgers concludes that only about one-quarter of the gap is based on factors such as experience and education.

So, whether intentional or unintentional, racial bias does exist and it helps to explain some of the reasons for high unemployment amongst blacks and our unequal earning power once we're hired. Well, great research is now supporting what we already knew for the past 20 years or so.

But, what is this we read in this article about 'blacks legacy of lagging economic performance?' Could that be alluding to a perception in America that we are economically enslaved and what exactly does that mean anyway? I look at it this way.

When whites, hispanics, and asians think about their careers and whom they have worked for, how often does black owned businesses come into that equation for them, probably not too often if ever. However, when black people do the same reflection, every race shows up in our history.

Overall, the lack of knowledge of America about the success that we have and continue to have in business works against us even in the hiring process to get a job. Somehow, the fact that most successful black business is under capitalized and has not given favorable credit terms has not been shared with America goes unnoticed.

Not to the mention that the reality is that we (black folk) were the only race that could endure and withstand the rigors of working sun up to sun down in the south harvesting crops is quickly forgotten and overlooked in history. The native Americans got sick too fast if they didn't escape because of their familiarity with the land. The white indentured servants couldn't hang either. Trust me folks, if blacks were really "lazy" then king cotton and sugar and tobacco would not have made it to market and slavery wouldn't have lasted 400 years on our backs. No houses would have gotten cleaned and no meals would have been cooked, etc. Please give me a break, blacks legacy of economics certainly can't be that we don't work.

Even in sports we see the bias clearly in front of our faces. For years, blacks were denied the opportunity to coach and to play certain positions in football. The three most leadership and intellectually demanding positions in football where historically reserved for whites. That is Middle linebacker on defense, center on the offensive line and quarterback.

1. middle linebacker - calls and aligns the defense on the field
2. center- makes adjustment at the line before the ball is snapped
3. quarterback - calls the plays on the field and leads the offense

I always joke that in 1999 when the NFL drafted 5 black quarterbacks in the first round, that black people after 30 years had finally learned how to play quarterback. Yes, no need to research folks on this one, racial bias in America is real. So the question becomes is there any bias in our educational system too?

BIAS IN EDUCATION 

In another article on Yahoo News called the Upshot, written November 10, 2010 by Zachary Roth we learn:

The study found that just 12 percent of black fourth-grade boys are proficient in reading, compared with 38 percent of white boys, the New York Times reports.  Only 12 percent of black eighth-grade boys are proficient in math, compared with 44 percent of white boys.

The report also says that black boys drop out of high school at nearly twice the rate of white boys, and have SAT scores that are 104 points lower, on average. Poverty isn't the sole explanation for the differences.  The report found that poor white boys do as well at reading and math as non-poor black boys.

This clearly shows a bias in the educational system of America and reveals that African-American youth are at extreme disadvantages to compete in a global marketplace.  Further research on this topic done by The Schott 50 State Report on Public Education and Black Males clarifies the bias in this way:

Black male students do much better in schools where most of the students are White, non-Hispanics; and White, non-Hispanic students and Asian students do poorly in schools where most of the students are Black. It is not a matter of the "benefits" for Black students from sitting next to White students; it is that a much higher proportion of White, non-Hispanic and Asian-American students in each state are enrolled in well-resourced schools than Black students. In most of the country, the chances that a Black male will have highly effective teachers are a third of that for White, non-Hispanic male students.

This reinforces what Malcolm spoke of when referring to the vicious cycle in our community. Reality however really hits home when we begin discussing unemployment rates. The challenge we really face is that we must confront the chronic high unemployment rate that has become a 'noose' around the neck of our community. This noose is slowly choking the life out of our community and has us constantly on life support.

ENDING LIFE SUPPORT

The life support is government programs such as food stamps, welfare and unemployment benefits to name a few.  We must begin to end our enslavement by building businesses that create sustainable jobs in our communities. We must organize and challenge our leaders and politicians to focus on ending the HISTORIC CHRONIC unemployment rate in the black community.

This statistic has gone on far too long for us to keep acting as if it is business as usual. We have enough data on unemployment, enough evidence of bias in America's hiring practices, evidence in education, etc. Now its time for America to help us to build strong black businesses that will address this chronic condition.

The hell with SBA programs etc. Its time for America to bring real capital into our communities to open up black owned and run factories and plants that produce products of all types that can be sold in the supermarkets, in prisons, and in government agencies. That is where the battle line for my generation, those born in the 1950 and 1960's needs to begin.

Yes, we are economically enslaved and yes we have chronic unemployment but since there is a cure then we need to get off of LIFE SUPPORT and live a NORMAL life!

For those new to the blog, please read my other posts by searching under 'buy black'.All comments welcome and appreciated. Let's learn and grow together.

Please encourage a friend to check out the articles. I will be writing one or two every month and continue my ongoing research on the topic.

Rich Mind