More than half of black males between the ages of 16 and 19 are unemployed, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. And that’s only counting those seeking work. Economists say legions of other young black men ”” nobody knows how many ”” have given up looking.
Sitting in an empty classroom at the YouthBuild Charter School in Washington, D.C., Andre Johnson, 18, talks about his fruitless job search.
“I apply for jobs every day,” he says. “And usually I do it online, ’cause I know before when I used to go in the stores, they used to look at me actually different and weird, and they say, ‘Oh we don’t have no applications or nothing,’ and I never believed them.”
Academics believe fewer than 14 in 100 young black men actually have jobs. Washington, D.C., has the worst teen employment rate in the country, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
The entirety of this enormous problem cannot be laid up to America’s black culture, although a certain percentage certainly can. Hopelessness is an insidious nation-damaging problem.
When African-American students are [url=http://volokh.com/2009/12/29/150000-settlement-for-black-public-school-students-harassed-by-other-black-students-for-acting-white/]harassed for “acting white”[/url] because they actually want to study hard … that’s a cultural problem.
When politicians repeatedly raise the minimum wage, greatly increasing the risk to employers of giving someone a chance to see whether his attitude is good or not … that’s a political problem.
In the event, the intersection of the two generates just about the results you’d expect.
Bart, I’m not sure what “acting white” is. Is there something about “acting white” that makes a “white person” more employable? You might want to spend a bit more time with a wider cross section of African Americans.
Perhaps you might want to google Roland G. Fryer. He’s got some interesting things to say about the subject. As far as minimum wage goes, you’ll have to come up with some pretty solid evidence to refute the Card-Kreuger Study. I’m not saying you’re wrong, but that it’s not as simple as you make it sound.
Years of disinvestment in black neighborhoods and a perpetual diminishment of black political power hasn’t helped. Blacks may be responsible in some fashion, but it doesn’t let the rest of us off the hook.
“Acting white” was the perps’ choice of words, not mine.
In this particular case, yes, there is something about being “white” (again, the perps’ choice of words, not mine) that makes a person more employable: a willingness to work hard, to learn, and to make an effort to advance oneself through one’s own efforts rather than a sense of entitlement. Those characteristics are widespread and deeply ingrained in a majority of immigrants from places like Uganda, Sudan, Trinidad, Barbados, or Zambia, and with only rare exceptions such folks make excellent employees.
I don’t believe in any reporting by NPR.
Well, Bart, I’ll agree that those are virtues. But are you saying that there aren’t any kids, who’ve grown up in prosperity, who think that they’re own life style is due to them? Their parents pay for everything, and yet they think life owes them something; they work at daddy’s company, believing its on merit; get connections through their prep school; benefit from all sorts of things without thinking it was luck that got them there. They are the people who were born on third base, and thought they hit a triple. It’s interesting that when you think of someone lazy you think of a young black kid rather than Paris Hilton. I don’t resent either myself; I’d probably rather hang out with Paris. But I don’t think there is any distinguishable characteristic between the sins of the rich or the poor; except that the rich have more money, and can afford to learn from their mistakes. The poor quickly get criminal records, the dole, or a series of jobs without much advancement.