Business
Innovation, entrepreneurship the only means to combat African-American unemployment
The U.S. Census Bureau has reported that 46.2 million Americans were now living in poverty. Unfortunately, African Americans are worst hit.
The black unemployment rate of 16.7 percent is nearly double the 9 percent national rate.
Some lawmakers, pundits and academics have insisted that President Obama should come up with an economic plan targeted at helping the hardest-hit African Americans, but it is no fairer to expect Obama alone to fix the problems of black America than it is to suggest that he created the country’s economic dilemma in the first place.
The reality is that the good manufacturing and blue-collar jobs that were once a ticket to the middle class for many people had been drying up for years, long before the recession began. As America redevelops its economy, now is the time to redesign a black economic infrastructure, rooted in innovation, entrepreneurship and global trade, all of which are important for job creation.