Business
Where are the jobs of the future African-American worker?
Official unemployment for African-Americans exceeded 17 percent in January 2010, nearly twice that of whites and 6 points higher than the nation as a whole. As talk of a quickening recovery filled the airwaves, the unemployment rate for African-Americans has since declined to 14 percent. But double-digit official unemployment has been the standard for decades. The economic crisis has shifted the nation’s focus to job creation, but within the African-American community, a 40-year crisis of economic insecurity and dreams deferred exists with solutions that are just as unclear.
Since 1972, when the government began collecting employment data by race and ethnicity, the unemployment rate for African-Americans has always exceeded that of their white counterparts by a about 2-to-1, even when taking into account national economic conditions and educational advancement for African-Americans.
African-Americans also are disproportionately among those who are underemployed or who have given up looking for work, 22 percent, though they comprise only 12 percent of the labor force.