( - promoted by Sheila Webb-Halpern)
On Thursday, Senators Charles Grassley and Max Baucus unveiled their new jobs bill, the HIRE (Hiring Incentives to Restore Employment) Act. This is a welcome measure for a country that is still deep in a recession. Jobs, along with credit, are at the center of this economic downturn. (For a visual, this time-lapse map of county-by-county unemployment shows just how stark the rise has been.) Now that the credit markets have been at least partially freed up, the argument goes, jobs are what this country needs most.
But unemployment isn’t just as simple as a single figure. Aside from the problematic ways in which that one number is tabulated (for example, it doesn’t take into account people no longer looking for work), there are geographic and racial discrepancies in unemployment numbers that cannot be ignored. While the overall unemployment rate dropped in January to 9.7 percent, the figures were less promising for African-Americans. Overall unemployment in the African-American community rose to 16.5 percent, and unemployment among black men rose a full percentage point to 17.6 percent – a high for this current recession. |
Unemployment rates higher than the national average are nothing new in the black community, and especially among black men. In December 2007, when the overall unemployment rate was only 4.6 percent, unemployment in the African-American community was 8.6 percent. Current unemployment rates for young African-Americans are even higher: black youth between the ages of 20 and 24 have seen a 4.8 percent rise in their unemployment to a whopping 26.4 percent. One in four black youth are currently unemployed – and as I mentioned above, this only counts those who are currently looking for work. (For more disturbing and under-reported figures on how minorities have fared during this recession, see the Center for American Progress’s recent report “The State of Minorities in the Economy.”) Given these statistics, I think it’s fair to say that while the country as a whole has moved from economic boom to recession in the last few years, the black community has moved from recession to depression.
The reasons for these higher unemployment figures are complex, but they are certainly not as simple as job loss during a period of economic contraction. Even during the fat times of 2004, the statistics were staggering, especially when we look at numbers other than official unemployment. For example, a 2004 report from the Community Service Society of New York found that barely 50 percent of black men in New York City were employed in 2003; one can imagine this number is higher today. This is just the tip of the iceberg. Inflation-adjusted wages in the black community continue to decline, and are the lowest of any racial group in the country. One out of five black families lives in poverty; almost half of single-mother black families live in poverty (statistics here, courtesy of The Root).
How do we address these disturbing statistics? We need to focus on the causes specific to the black community, like incarceration, wage discrepancy, educational disparities, and many others. But President Obama has not been speaking this language; perhaps understandably, he has been fond of the old adage that a rising tide lifts all ships:
“So my general approach is that if the economy is strong, that will lift all boats as long as it is also supported by, for example, strategies around college affordability and job training, tax cuts for working families as opposed to the wealthiest that level the playing field and ensure bottom-up economic growth. And I’m confident that that will help the African-American community live out the American dream at the same time that it’s helping communities all across the country.”
This is of course a complicated issue for the president, one made more complicated by his race. The appearance of “favoritism” is an important concern, and I can understand why he feels it is necessary to target his legislative agenda only to the country as a whole. President Obama himself said as much in a radio interview with American Urban Radio Networks, a group of black-owned stations: “I can’t pass laws that say I’m just helping black folks. I’m the president of the United States. What I can do is make sure that I am passing laws that help all people, particularly those who are most vulnerable and most in need. That in turn is going to help lift up the African-American community.”
And there is some indication from the administration that they understand the different focus that the black community needs. Christina Romer, the chair of the president’s Council of Economic Advisors, recently said, regarding the black unemployment figures: “The fact that it’s more for African-Americans emphasizes that it’s important to try targeted actions to deal with this.”
So does the HIRE Act address the specific needs of the black community? Not exactly. It contains much of the expected: incentives for hiring and retaining unemployed workers, subsidies for public works bonds, and transit infrastructure development. But it does little to address sustainable good job creation or training, and it does not address any programs specifically to the black community. It doesn’t establish a living wage, paid sick leave, or other changes that could help create an economy where everyone can work with dignity and economic security. Nor does it deal with any of the underlying factors for skyrocketing black unemployment, such as educational disparities or incarceration rates. As Marc Lamont Hill, an associate professor of education at Columbia, said in a recent article, “there are a set of circumstances in place that make it more difficult for Black people to get job ready, to get jobs that they’re qualified for, and to get appropriate wages if they get the job ... So at a moment where President Obama has expressed a commitment to creating a rising tide that will lift all boats, we have to acknowledge the fact that the Black boat has a hole in it that has come from centuries of foreign and domestic policies that has crippled our community.”
Despite the lack of promise in this proposed bill, there are those in the progressive foundation world who have begun to draw increased attention to the crisis of unemployment and general lack of opportunity in the black community, and especially among black men. Jewish Funds for Justice’s close partner 21st Century Foundation and the Open Society Institute both have programs dedicated to this very issue. The OSI website is an especially great resource, with links to media reports and public presentations on the topic.
And even if the HIRE Act did contain the sorts of programs needed to confront the issues facing the black community, one piece of legislation is by no means enough to keep the boat afloat. What the President needs to do, as politically risky as it may be, is to take OSI and 21CF as examples and establish a taskforce on Black economic security and achievement. With inequality and injustice as deeply ingrained as it is in the black community, no one-off program can address the issues at hand. Only comprehensive, multi-faceted, long-term community investment, including education and prison reform and targeted and sustainable good job creation and training, can begin to caulk the centuries-old hole in the “Black boat.” |
