Understanding the Low Wages of Black Workers- Full from Economic Policy Institute on Vimeo.
3/15/2011
Low-Income Renters Suffering
The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development recently released its biannual report to Congress on the housing needs of low income Americans.
It shows an increased number of very low-income households have severe housing difficulties, particularly housing costs that far exceed what they can afford.
[Read more]
It shows an increased number of very low-income households have severe housing difficulties, particularly housing costs that far exceed what they can afford.
[Read more]
3/14/2011
Why Do Blacks Earn Less?
In 2008, the nation elected its first black president, Barack Obama. While some were celebrating the supposed arrival of a post-racial America, black men more generally earned only 71% of what white men earned. The median hourly wage for black male full-time workers was $14.90; for comparable white workers it was $20.84. There is no reason to expect that these differences are significantly smaller today.
Educational and other differences can explain some, but not all, of the black-white wage gap. At the end of the day, it turns out that being black matters. Two new reports that I co-authored show that neither education, skills nor culture fully explain the black-white wage disparities. The first report focuses on the occupations of black men, the second on the wages of black immigrants.
Black workers do not have equal access to all jobs. “Whiter Jobs, Higher Wages” [PDF] by Darrick Hamilton, William Darity, Jr. and myself shows that, after making adjustments for educational attainment, black men are underrepresented in 49% of all occupations and overrepresented in 38%. Thus, only 13% of occupations look like what we would expect in a land of equal opportunity.
This uneven occupational distribution is particularly important because the occupations where black men are overrepresented have an average wage that is nearly $14,000 less than the occupations where black men are underrepresented. In other words, the whiter the workforce for an occupation is the higher the pay.
This finding of whiter jobs, higher pay is not specific to any class of occupations. Blacks in managerial and professional occupations are overrepresented in the lower-paying managerial and professional occupations. Blacks in the service sector are overrepresented in the lower-paying service occupations. Blacks in manufacturing and transportation occupations are overrepresented in the lower-paying manufacturing and transportation occupations. It does not matter whether occupations require “soft skills,” “hard skills,” or managerial skills, blacks will be overrepresented in the lower-paying jobs.
The conventional wisdom that black immigrants do better economically than U.S.-born blacks because black immigrants supposedly have better cultural values also does not hold up to scrutiny. Patrick Mason and I examine the socio-economic standing and wages of black immigrants relative to U.S.-born whites and blacks in “The Low Wages of Black Immigrants” [PDF].
On all measures, U.S.-born whites come out ahead of the pack. After taking into account 15 wage-relevant factors, we find that black immigrants do not earn higher wages than U.S.-born blacks. In fact, some black immigrant groups do worse. The wages of Haitian and African men are particularly low relative to similar U.S.-born white and black men.
The major point, however, is that all blacks, U.S.-born and foreign-born, face similar economic problems. If one wants to succeed economically in American society, it helps to be white.
Educational and other differences can explain some, but not all, of the black-white wage gap. At the end of the day, it turns out that being black matters. Two new reports that I co-authored show that neither education, skills nor culture fully explain the black-white wage disparities. The first report focuses on the occupations of black men, the second on the wages of black immigrants.
Black workers do not have equal access to all jobs. “Whiter Jobs, Higher Wages” [PDF] by Darrick Hamilton, William Darity, Jr. and myself shows that, after making adjustments for educational attainment, black men are underrepresented in 49% of all occupations and overrepresented in 38%. Thus, only 13% of occupations look like what we would expect in a land of equal opportunity.
This uneven occupational distribution is particularly important because the occupations where black men are overrepresented have an average wage that is nearly $14,000 less than the occupations where black men are underrepresented. In other words, the whiter the workforce for an occupation is the higher the pay.
This finding of whiter jobs, higher pay is not specific to any class of occupations. Blacks in managerial and professional occupations are overrepresented in the lower-paying managerial and professional occupations. Blacks in the service sector are overrepresented in the lower-paying service occupations. Blacks in manufacturing and transportation occupations are overrepresented in the lower-paying manufacturing and transportation occupations. It does not matter whether occupations require “soft skills,” “hard skills,” or managerial skills, blacks will be overrepresented in the lower-paying jobs.
The conventional wisdom that black immigrants do better economically than U.S.-born blacks because black immigrants supposedly have better cultural values also does not hold up to scrutiny. Patrick Mason and I examine the socio-economic standing and wages of black immigrants relative to U.S.-born whites and blacks in “The Low Wages of Black Immigrants” [PDF].
On all measures, U.S.-born whites come out ahead of the pack. After taking into account 15 wage-relevant factors, we find that black immigrants do not earn higher wages than U.S.-born blacks. In fact, some black immigrant groups do worse. The wages of Haitian and African men are particularly low relative to similar U.S.-born white and black men.
The major point, however, is that all blacks, U.S.-born and foreign-born, face similar economic problems. If one wants to succeed economically in American society, it helps to be white.
3/13/2011
Pay Teachers More
From the debates in Wisconsin and elsewhere about public sector unions, you might get the impression that we’re going bust because teachers are overpaid.
That’s a pernicious fallacy. A basic educational challenge is not that teachers are raking it in, but that they are underpaid. If we want to compete with other countries, and chip away at poverty across America, then we need to pay teachers more so as to attract better people into the profession.
[Read more]
That’s a pernicious fallacy. A basic educational challenge is not that teachers are raking it in, but that they are underpaid. If we want to compete with other countries, and chip away at poverty across America, then we need to pay teachers more so as to attract better people into the profession.
[Read more]
3/10/2011
American Oligarchy
Congressional freshmen include dozens of millionaires, financial disclosures show
The members of this year's freshman class in Congress are far wealthier than the people they represent, with dozens of millionaires joining the ranks of the House and Senate, according to an analysis released Wednesday.
The Center for Responsive Politics calculates that 60 percent of Senate freshmen and 40 percent of new House lawmakers are worth $1 million or more, according to financial disclosure forms that provide ranges of assets held by each member. The nonprofit group, which tracks money in politics, notes that only about 1 percent of Americans are worth that much.
[Read more]
The members of this year's freshman class in Congress are far wealthier than the people they represent, with dozens of millionaires joining the ranks of the House and Senate, according to an analysis released Wednesday.
The Center for Responsive Politics calculates that 60 percent of Senate freshmen and 40 percent of new House lawmakers are worth $1 million or more, according to financial disclosure forms that provide ranges of assets held by each member. The nonprofit group, which tracks money in politics, notes that only about 1 percent of Americans are worth that much.
[Read more]
More on the New Jim Crow
Fla. Republicans make it harder for ex-felons to vote
Florida Gov. Rick Scott (R) and his fellow statewide elected officials agreed Wednesday to roll back rules enacted four years ago that had made it easier for many released felons in the state to regain the right to vote.
. . .
The 2007 rule change allowed more than 100,000 felons who had completed their sentences to be able to register to vote ahead of the 2008 election, in which Barack Obama swept Florida. Experts say many of those new voters were probably Democratic-leaning African Americans.
[Read more]
Florida Gov. Rick Scott (R) and his fellow statewide elected officials agreed Wednesday to roll back rules enacted four years ago that had made it easier for many released felons in the state to regain the right to vote.
. . .
The 2007 rule change allowed more than 100,000 felons who had completed their sentences to be able to register to vote ahead of the 2008 election, in which Barack Obama swept Florida. Experts say many of those new voters were probably Democratic-leaning African Americans.
[Read more]
Black Urban Flight Changing America’s Political Face
LOS ANGELES--A decade ago it was odd to see young (and not-so-young whites) walking their dogs, jogging and attending community meetings around my neighborhood in the western section of South Los Angeles. That’s not the case anymore.
Young and not-so-young whites are now a fixture in the neighborhood—and in many others. The black population of Los Angeles has shrunk from nearly 20 percent of the city’s overall population in 1970 to less than 10 percent today.
[Read more.]
Young and not-so-young whites are now a fixture in the neighborhood—and in many others. The black population of Los Angeles has shrunk from nearly 20 percent of the city’s overall population in 1970 to less than 10 percent today.
[Read more.]
2/28/2011
Racial Discrimination Keeps Popping Up as the Likely Culprit
. . . Behind the Low Wages of Black Workers
Whiter jobs, higher wages: Occupational segregation and the lower wages of black men
In 2008, the year of the election of the nation’s first black president, black men earned only 71% of what white men earned. In this report we examine how occupational segregation based on race is related to this disparity. We find that even after taking educational attainment into account, black men are overrepresented in low-wage jobs and underrepresented in high-wage jobs. Neither hard skills, soft skills, nor black men’s occupational interests provide convincing explanations for black male sorting into low-wage occupations.
The most plausible explanation we find is that labor market discrimination excludes many black men from high- wage jobs. Therefore, effectively combating employment discrimination will contribute significantly to closing the racial earnings gap and improving the socioeconomic position of black families and black communities.
[Read more]
The low wages of black immigrants: Wage penalties for U.S.-born and foreign-born black workers
The popular discussion of black immigrants often exaggerates their achievements and denigrates U.S.-born blacks. One regularly hears asked, “Why do black immigrants do better than native blacks?” (Coates 2009). In these discussions, black immigrants usually are presented as hard working, valuing education, entrepreneurial, and family-oriented. U.S.-born blacks are often presented as lacking all of these characteristics, and sometimes even described as carrying “victimhood baggage” (Coates 2009; Marshall 2006). Many such discussions are driven by anecdotes, and even when these issues are explored using actual data, rarely are comparisons based on more than one measure; rarer still is there a comparison of how black immigrants fare in comparison with native whites.
This report aims to deepen the public discussion by conducting a broader, more careful examination of the socio-economic standing of black immigrants relative to U.S.-born blacks and whites.
[From the Conclusion]
The fact that black immigrant groups—who are said to be hardworking, valuing education, entrepreneurial, and family-oriented—do relatively poorly in finding work, obtaining a good wage, and staying out of poverty suggests that the playing field is not as level as popularly believed. The fact that all of these groups are black may contribute to their hardships in the United States.
[Read more]
2/22/2011
2/17/2011
2/14/2011
Black America's Unrequited Love [re-post from Feb. 2010]
The conventional wisdom is that because of a rise in interracial relationships, all Americans will be brown in the future. Henry Louis Gates Jr., for example, recently stated, "I'm looking forward to the time when we all look like Polynesians." Current data, however, suggests that the most we might see in the future is the beige-ing--not the browning--of the white population. Additionally, we can expect to see a phenotypic black population into the foreseeable future because while blacks seem somewhat open to interracial relationships, non-blacks prefer whites over blacks. In the American "melting pot," blacks are the least loved group.
While blacks appear to be the most racially tolerant Americans, they are the least tolerated racial group. These are the conclusions suggested by a recent Pew Research Center survey on racial attitudes. Blacks are more likely to accept an interracial marriage by a family member than are whites and Hispanics. But whites and Hispanics view blacks as the least desirable group for interracial marriage.
Given a choice between an Asian or a black person as a relative, whites choose Asians. Nearly three-quarters (73 percent) of all whites are "fine" with a family member marrying an Asian, but only 64 percent are comfortable with a family member marrying a black person.
Hispanics are more positive toward interracial marriage and toward blacks than whites. The highest rate of acceptance of interracial marriage whites express is 73 percent. The lowest rate of acceptance for Hispanics is 73 percent for a family member marrying a black person. The highest rate of acceptance for Hispanics is 81 percent for a family member marrying a white person. While Hispanics are more accepting of blacks than whites, they still express a greater rate of support for a white person joining the family than a black person.
Interestingly, when one examines blacks' preferences for specific groups, blacks show no favoritism toward any group. Among blacks, the acceptance rate for whites and Asians is 80 percent and 81 percent for Hispanics.
The Pew Research Center data is an attitude survey. It records what people say they would do which may be different from what they actually do. It also asks about a family member and not about the interviewee. A person might accept a family member marrying someone of another race while they think that interracial marriage is unacceptable for themselves.
There is data that provides some insight into people's actual racial preferences for love and marriage. The dating website OkCupid conducted an analysis of response rates to first-contact messages from potential male and female suitors. The analysis took account of compatibility, attractiveness and height. The OkCupid analyst found that white, Hispanic and Asian women on average revealed strong preferences for white men. Black women had the lowest response rates. In the interracial online dating world, white men have a distinct advantage. Blacks are disadvantaged and especially black women.
Interracial marriage data from the 2000 Census paints a picture similar to OkCupid's findings. Asian and Hispanic women have higher rates of intermarriage than white and black women. More than one-in-five married Asian women (22 percent) were married to non-Asian men. Eighteen of the 22 percent of Asian women were married to white men. The overall out-marriage rate for Hispanics was a little lower, 18 percent, with 15 percent of Hispanic women married to white men. Only 4 percent of married black women were married to non-blacks, and only 2 percent were married to white men. Asian and Hispanic women are much more likely to marry outside of their race than black women and when they do marry outside of their racial group in the vast majority of cases it is to white men.
The picture for married men of color differed from that of women. While Asian women were the most likely to be married to someone of another race, among men, Hispanic men were the most likely to marry outside of their group. Fifteen percent of Hispanic men married non-Hispanics with the vast majority (13 out of the 15 percent) marrying white women. Black and Asian men were equally likely to marry outside of their race with an out-marriage rate of 9 percent for both. Six percent of black men married white women and 7 percent of Asian men did the same.
The attitudinal data shows non-blacks less accepting of interracial marriage with blacks compared to other groups. The online dating data shows that blacks, and particularly black women, are seen as less desirable for romantic relationships. The marriage data shows that black women have very low marriage rates to non-blacks and to white men specifically.
If there is a mixed-race future for America, at present, it looks like it will largely exclude blacks.
While blacks appear to be the most racially tolerant Americans, they are the least tolerated racial group. These are the conclusions suggested by a recent Pew Research Center survey on racial attitudes. Blacks are more likely to accept an interracial marriage by a family member than are whites and Hispanics. But whites and Hispanics view blacks as the least desirable group for interracial marriage.
Given a choice between an Asian or a black person as a relative, whites choose Asians. Nearly three-quarters (73 percent) of all whites are "fine" with a family member marrying an Asian, but only 64 percent are comfortable with a family member marrying a black person.
Hispanics are more positive toward interracial marriage and toward blacks than whites. The highest rate of acceptance of interracial marriage whites express is 73 percent. The lowest rate of acceptance for Hispanics is 73 percent for a family member marrying a black person. The highest rate of acceptance for Hispanics is 81 percent for a family member marrying a white person. While Hispanics are more accepting of blacks than whites, they still express a greater rate of support for a white person joining the family than a black person.
Interestingly, when one examines blacks' preferences for specific groups, blacks show no favoritism toward any group. Among blacks, the acceptance rate for whites and Asians is 80 percent and 81 percent for Hispanics.
The Pew Research Center data is an attitude survey. It records what people say they would do which may be different from what they actually do. It also asks about a family member and not about the interviewee. A person might accept a family member marrying someone of another race while they think that interracial marriage is unacceptable for themselves.
There is data that provides some insight into people's actual racial preferences for love and marriage. The dating website OkCupid conducted an analysis of response rates to first-contact messages from potential male and female suitors. The analysis took account of compatibility, attractiveness and height. The OkCupid analyst found that white, Hispanic and Asian women on average revealed strong preferences for white men. Black women had the lowest response rates. In the interracial online dating world, white men have a distinct advantage. Blacks are disadvantaged and especially black women.
Interracial marriage data from the 2000 Census paints a picture similar to OkCupid's findings. Asian and Hispanic women have higher rates of intermarriage than white and black women. More than one-in-five married Asian women (22 percent) were married to non-Asian men. Eighteen of the 22 percent of Asian women were married to white men. The overall out-marriage rate for Hispanics was a little lower, 18 percent, with 15 percent of Hispanic women married to white men. Only 4 percent of married black women were married to non-blacks, and only 2 percent were married to white men. Asian and Hispanic women are much more likely to marry outside of their race than black women and when they do marry outside of their racial group in the vast majority of cases it is to white men.
The picture for married men of color differed from that of women. While Asian women were the most likely to be married to someone of another race, among men, Hispanic men were the most likely to marry outside of their group. Fifteen percent of Hispanic men married non-Hispanics with the vast majority (13 out of the 15 percent) marrying white women. Black and Asian men were equally likely to marry outside of their race with an out-marriage rate of 9 percent for both. Six percent of black men married white women and 7 percent of Asian men did the same.
The attitudinal data shows non-blacks less accepting of interracial marriage with blacks compared to other groups. The online dating data shows that blacks, and particularly black women, are seen as less desirable for romantic relationships. The marriage data shows that black women have very low marriage rates to non-blacks and to white men specifically.
If there is a mixed-race future for America, at present, it looks like it will largely exclude blacks.
A First Take on the President's Budget
from the New York Times
Cool budget tool here.
from the Congressional Black Caucus: Eight Budget Cuts to Note
Number 1: President Obama is proposing to cut $2.5 billion in heating assistance for low-income people (LIHEAP). About 8.3 million households in the U.S. used the program in 2010.
Number 8: The House GOP is proposing a cut of $210 million from Maternal and Child Health Block Grants. This would chop the program by 30%. Like the WIC program, the grants assist low-income pregnant women and their children in accessing health care.
[Read more]
Cool budget tool here.
from the Congressional Black Caucus: Eight Budget Cuts to Note
Number 1: President Obama is proposing to cut $2.5 billion in heating assistance for low-income people (LIHEAP). About 8.3 million households in the U.S. used the program in 2010.
Number 8: The House GOP is proposing a cut of $210 million from Maternal and Child Health Block Grants. This would chop the program by 30%. Like the WIC program, the grants assist low-income pregnant women and their children in accessing health care.
[Read more]
2/08/2011
EPI Event: Understanding the Low Wages of Black Workers
The election of Barack Obama, in 2008, stands as the high-water mark for the achievement of a black male in the United States. Yet in that same year, black men earned only 71% of what white men earned. Such disparities are popularly attributed to deficiencies among American-born black men.
On February 28, 2011, the Economic Policy Institute’s Program on Race, Ethnicity and the Economy will conduct a detailed exploration of the low wages of black workers by examining the noncollege labor market, the wages of black immigrants, and the wages of black men in different occupations. The Program’s director, Algernon Austin, will moderate this forum, which will unveil the findings of two new studies that hold popular perceptions about blacks in the low-wage labor market up to vigorous analysis.
Monday, February 28, 2011
Registration begins at 9:45 am
10:00 - 11:30 a.m.
Economic Policy Institute
1333 H St., NW, Washington, DC 20005
Refreshments will be served.
RSVP here
Featured Speakers:
Pamela J. Loprest, Urban Institute
Co-author of Working for Cents on the Dollar: Race and Ethnic Wage Gaps in the Noncollege Labor Market
Patrick L. Mason, Florida State University
Co-author of The Low Wages of Black Immigrants: Wage Penalties for U.S.-Born and Foreign-Born Black Workers
Darrick Hamilton, Milano: The New School for Management and Urban Policy
Co-author of Occupational Segregation and the Lower Wages of Black Men
RSVP here
On February 28, 2011, the Economic Policy Institute’s Program on Race, Ethnicity and the Economy will conduct a detailed exploration of the low wages of black workers by examining the noncollege labor market, the wages of black immigrants, and the wages of black men in different occupations. The Program’s director, Algernon Austin, will moderate this forum, which will unveil the findings of two new studies that hold popular perceptions about blacks in the low-wage labor market up to vigorous analysis.
Monday, February 28, 2011
Registration begins at 9:45 am
10:00 - 11:30 a.m.
Economic Policy Institute
1333 H St., NW, Washington, DC 20005
Refreshments will be served.
RSVP here
Featured Speakers:
Pamela J. Loprest, Urban Institute
Co-author of Working for Cents on the Dollar: Race and Ethnic Wage Gaps in the Noncollege Labor Market
Patrick L. Mason, Florida State University
Co-author of The Low Wages of Black Immigrants: Wage Penalties for U.S.-Born and Foreign-Born Black Workers
Darrick Hamilton, Milano: The New School for Management and Urban Policy
Co-author of Occupational Segregation and the Lower Wages of Black Men
RSVP here
1/30/2011
Increasing American Economic Growth and Competitiveness
Remarks prepared for the Congressional Black Caucus Commission on the Budget Deficit, Economic Crisis, and Wealth Creation
by Algernon Austin, January 27, 2011
Currently, there are over 14 million Americans who would like to work but cannot find work. This is the most important immediate problem facing the country. Although African-American workers only make up 12% of the American labor force, blacks make up 20% of the unemployed. Our ability to create jobs—sooner rather than later—matters a great deal for the well-being of millions of American families. Our failure to create jobs causes people to lose their homes, produces increases in family stress, and leads children to drop out of school.
A serious longer-term problem is the economic decline of the United States relative to other nations. In the 1950s and 1960s, the United States led the world on many important measures. Today, the United States has fallen behind. If we fail to invest in our people, in our infrastructure, and in research and development we will continue to fall behind. Even worse, we will stand by as we watch our country literally fall apart.
The good news is that we can go a long way to address these two problems—the immediate problem of a high rate of joblessness and the longer-term problem of America’s declining competitiveness—with one solution—smart investments now. The federal government needs to make investments rapidly in education, infrastructure, and research and development to make us more competitive globally. These investments if done quickly and substantially will create millions of jobs to address the current jobs crisis.
Falling Behind and Falling Apart
Below are just a few examples of how the United States is currently failing to make the necessary investments in education, infrastructure, and research and development.
Education
Infrastructure
Research and Development
Rising to the Sputnik Moment
If the United States wishes to remain a leader in the global economy we must make significant investments in education, infrastructure and research and development. If we make these investments now, the jobs created will help reduce the high levels of unemployment the country is currently facing.
Investments in Education
Disadvantaged children tend to begin school already behind their more advantaged peers, and these achievement gaps only widen through the children’s educational career. To increase America’s educational performance, we need to break these patterns.
We need to make the necessary investments:
Investments in Infrastructure
The infrastructure needed for the productivity, safety and health of the nation is falling apart. We need to make the necessary investments:
The expansion and modernization of our public transportation systems are particularly important for our low-income population. These improvements to these systems will allow low-income workers greater access to jobs. Increased use of new and efficient public transportation has the additional benefits of reducing our dependency on fossil fuels and on foreign energy.
Investments in Research and Development
In the State of the Union address, President Obama stated, “In America, innovation doesn’t just change our lives. It is how we make our living.” Yet, the United States is falling behind in its investments in research and development. We need more investments in R&D to ensure that America continues its innovation leadership.
Can We Afford These Investments?
America cannot maintain its leadership position in the world without these investments. America will not continue to be a vibrant, healthy and safe society if our infrastructure continues to decay. Our roads will not stop deteriorating, our water mains will not stop breaking without the necessary investments. In the long-term, the economic growth that these investments will produce will make us a stronger and richer nation. We will have more and stronger businesses and a better and more prosperous workforce. Our history and the history of other nations show that strong economic growth can effectively reduce a country’s debt load. The greatest risk to the United States is economic decline. And we will decline if we fail to make smart investments.
There are many options for generating revenues to pay for these investments. A few of these options are to reduce defense spending, to tax capital gains and dividends as ordinary income, to repeal the Bush-era tax cuts for top earners, and to adopt a financial speculation tax. For additional options and details see Investing in America’s Economy by Rebecca Theiss and Andrew Fieldhouse of the Economic Policy Institute.
by Algernon Austin, January 27, 2011
Currently, there are over 14 million Americans who would like to work but cannot find work. This is the most important immediate problem facing the country. Although African-American workers only make up 12% of the American labor force, blacks make up 20% of the unemployed. Our ability to create jobs—sooner rather than later—matters a great deal for the well-being of millions of American families. Our failure to create jobs causes people to lose their homes, produces increases in family stress, and leads children to drop out of school.
A serious longer-term problem is the economic decline of the United States relative to other nations. In the 1950s and 1960s, the United States led the world on many important measures. Today, the United States has fallen behind. If we fail to invest in our people, in our infrastructure, and in research and development we will continue to fall behind. Even worse, we will stand by as we watch our country literally fall apart.
The good news is that we can go a long way to address these two problems—the immediate problem of a high rate of joblessness and the longer-term problem of America’s declining competitiveness—with one solution—smart investments now. The federal government needs to make investments rapidly in education, infrastructure, and research and development to make us more competitive globally. These investments if done quickly and substantially will create millions of jobs to address the current jobs crisis.
Falling Behind and Falling Apart
Below are just a few examples of how the United States is currently failing to make the necessary investments in education, infrastructure, and research and development.
Education
- A 2008 UNICEF report ranked the United States 20th out of 24 countries in providing early childhood education.
- Fifteen year olds in the United States ranked 17th out of 65 countries in the 2009 Program for International Student Assessment reading test. U.S. students were 23rd in science and 31st in math.
- The College Board found that the United States ranked 12th out of 36 countries in the college completion rates of 25- to 34-year olds in 2007.
Infrastructure
- The American Society of Civil Engineers estimates that two-thirds of U.S. roads are in poor or mediocre condition.
- 27% of U.S. bridges are “structurally deficient” or “functionally obsolete. 29% of all transit assets are in poor or marginal condition.
- Each day in the United States, there are about 700 water main breaks, we lose 7 billion gallons of water from water main leaks, and we put the public at risk from contaminated water.
- An analysis by the 21st Century School Fund finds that we have neglected nearly $300 billion of required maintenance in our public schools.
Research and Development
- The United States falls behind seven other countries—Israel, Sweden, Finland, Japan, South Korea, Switzerland, and Iceland—in terms of research and development spending as a percent of GDP.
- The Economic Policy Institute found that the United States ranked 15th out of 30 nations in broadband penetration in 2007.
- McKinsey estimates that the total savings from revamping health IT across the U.S. provider landscape could be as much as $40 billion annually.
Rising to the Sputnik Moment
If the United States wishes to remain a leader in the global economy we must make significant investments in education, infrastructure and research and development. If we make these investments now, the jobs created will help reduce the high levels of unemployment the country is currently facing.
Investments in Education
Disadvantaged children tend to begin school already behind their more advantaged peers, and these achievement gaps only widen through the children’s educational career. To increase America’s educational performance, we need to break these patterns.
We need to make the necessary investments:
- in early childhood education so that all disadvantaged children attend high quality pre-kindergarten.
- to increase the quality of teachers serving disadvantaged children throughout their educational careers.
- to increase the number of teachers serving disadvantaged students so that these students attend classes with a low student-to-teacher ratio.
- so that our public colleges and universities do not have to raise their costs out of the price range of low-income students because of state deficits.
Investments in Infrastructure
The infrastructure needed for the productivity, safety and health of the nation is falling apart. We need to make the necessary investments:
- to repair, replace, and upgrade our deficient roads, bridges, water systems, power grids, and sewers.
- to repair, replace, upgrade and expand our public transportation systems.
- to modernize our school infrastructure so that all our students have access to 21st century technology and instructional resources.
The expansion and modernization of our public transportation systems are particularly important for our low-income population. These improvements to these systems will allow low-income workers greater access to jobs. Increased use of new and efficient public transportation has the additional benefits of reducing our dependency on fossil fuels and on foreign energy.
Investments in Research and Development
In the State of the Union address, President Obama stated, “In America, innovation doesn’t just change our lives. It is how we make our living.” Yet, the United States is falling behind in its investments in research and development. We need more investments in R&D to ensure that America continues its innovation leadership.
Can We Afford These Investments?
America cannot maintain its leadership position in the world without these investments. America will not continue to be a vibrant, healthy and safe society if our infrastructure continues to decay. Our roads will not stop deteriorating, our water mains will not stop breaking without the necessary investments. In the long-term, the economic growth that these investments will produce will make us a stronger and richer nation. We will have more and stronger businesses and a better and more prosperous workforce. Our history and the history of other nations show that strong economic growth can effectively reduce a country’s debt load. The greatest risk to the United States is economic decline. And we will decline if we fail to make smart investments.
There are many options for generating revenues to pay for these investments. A few of these options are to reduce defense spending, to tax capital gains and dividends as ordinary income, to repeal the Bush-era tax cuts for top earners, and to adopt a financial speculation tax. For additional options and details see Investing in America’s Economy by Rebecca Theiss and Andrew Fieldhouse of the Economic Policy Institute.
1/23/2011
Worth Reading [January 23, 2011]
Broad Racial Disparities Seen in Americans’ Ills
Poor Reason: Culture still doesn’t explain poverty
- White people in the United States die of drug overdoses more often than other ethnic groups.
- Blacks die of heart disease much more commonly than whites, and die younger, despite the availability of cheap prevention measures like weight loss, exercise, blood-pressure and cholesterol drugs, and aspirin. The same is true for strokes.
Poor Reason: Culture still doesn’t explain poverty
Notwithstanding the election of Barack Obama, the last 40 years have been a period of racial backlash. The three pillars of anti-racist public policy—affirmative action, school integration, and racial districting (to prevent the dilution of the black vote)—have all been eviscerated, thanks in large part to rulings of a Supreme Court packed with Republican appointees. Indeed, the comeback of the culture of poverty, albeit in new rhetorical guise, signifies a reversion to the status quo ante: to the discourses and concomitant policy agenda that existed before the black protest movement forced the nation to confront its collective guilt and responsibility for two centuries of slavery and a century of Jim Crow—racism that pervaded all major institutions of our society, North and South. Such momentous issues are brushed away as a new generation of sociologists delves into deliberately myopic examinations of a small sphere where culture makes some measurable difference—to prove that “culture matters.”[Read more]
1/16/2011
White Privilege and Illicit Drugs
The vast majority of drug users are white. This fact has been true for the entire "war on drugs." Many whites live in majority white states. Most whites live in segregated communities. How do these millions of whites get their drugs?
Dorm Room Dealers: Drugs and the Privileges of Race and Class by A. Rafik Mohamed and Erik D. Fritsvold is the first piece of research that I've seen that has taken a serious look at the white drug trade. Specifically, it examines the white, middle-class, college-student drug trade. It is a fascinating and highly readable investigation.
Before going into Dorm Room Dealers, it is useful to have some context for thinking about illicit drugs among the college-aged population. The rate of illicit drug and substance use is comparable among white and black youth, but generally it is slightly lower among blacks. Among 18-to-25 year olds, the 2009 National Survey of Drug Use and Health reports that 39 percent of whites used an illicit drug in the past year. For blacks, the rate was 34 percent. Some of these youth are experimenting with illicit drugs, and some are fairly regular users. The estimates for regular users are 23 percent for whites and 21 percent for blacks. This age group has the highest rate of illicit drug use.
What this means a bit more concretely is that there are about 5 million white 18-to-25 year olds who are regular illicit drug users compared to about 1 million black users. Given that there are roughly five white drug users for every one black drug user, it is incredible that nearly half of all people in state prison for drugs are black. This is an amazing criminal "justice" accomplishment. It is also a remarkable achievement of our culture that the strereotype of a drug dealer is a young black male, when it is fairly certain that at any given time the number of white dealers outnumbers the number of black dealers.
Dorm Room Dealers provides a view into this large and important but typically missing part of the story of illicit drug use in America. It shows how young, middle-class, white drug dealers manage to avoid prison and the stigma of drug dealing without even trying.
As mentioned above, the college-aged population has the highest rates of illicit drug use nationally. The students that the sociologists Mohamed and Fritsvold study do not challenge this finding. The campus drug dealers, if anything, struggle with the problem of having too many customers. Mohamed and Fritsvold report that among these white, middle-class college students,
Dorm-room dealing is low-risk because white, middle-class youth are "anti-targets" in the "war on drugs." In other words, they are invisible to law enforcement because they do not fit the popular stereotype of a drug dealer, or their drug dealing is consciously ignored by collegiate authorities. Despite "selling large enough quantities of marijuana and other drugs to warrant serious stretches of incarceration under current drug-sentencing schemes" none of the thirty dealers the authors studied was ever incarcerated "even when people in positions of formal authority were clearly aware or otherwise suspected them of illegal drug trafficking" (p.34). The dorm room dealers operated almost completely in the open and with impunity.
While public law enforcement might be ignorant and oblivious to the dorm-room dealers, on-campus authorities are in many cases aware but choose to ignore the dealers' activities. On-campus authorities have strong incentives to go this route. For a university,
Dorm Room Dealers is filled with insights about the white, middle-class drug trade and the many factors that make white, middle-class youth "anti-targets" in the war on drugs. One discovery completely surprised the authors. They did not realize how widespread the abuse of prescription drugs is. Students recklessly mixed different pills or took them with alcohol and, even after experiencing serious health episodes, did not seem to realize the danger they had put themselves in. One student reports his bad experiences with pharmaceuticals:
Among 18-to-25 year olds, white youth are two-and-a-half times as likely as black youth to abuse prescription drugs. The abuse of drugs like OxyContin kill more people than crack cocaine and yet, as measured by the intensity of our policing and prosecution, our criminal justice system views crack cocaine as the greater harm to society. Mohamed and Fritsvold conclude,
Copyright © Algernon Austin 2010
Dorm Room Dealers: Drugs and the Privileges of Race and Class by A. Rafik Mohamed and Erik D. Fritsvold is the first piece of research that I've seen that has taken a serious look at the white drug trade. Specifically, it examines the white, middle-class, college-student drug trade. It is a fascinating and highly readable investigation.
Before going into Dorm Room Dealers, it is useful to have some context for thinking about illicit drugs among the college-aged population. The rate of illicit drug and substance use is comparable among white and black youth, but generally it is slightly lower among blacks. Among 18-to-25 year olds, the 2009 National Survey of Drug Use and Health reports that 39 percent of whites used an illicit drug in the past year. For blacks, the rate was 34 percent. Some of these youth are experimenting with illicit drugs, and some are fairly regular users. The estimates for regular users are 23 percent for whites and 21 percent for blacks. This age group has the highest rate of illicit drug use.
What this means a bit more concretely is that there are about 5 million white 18-to-25 year olds who are regular illicit drug users compared to about 1 million black users. Given that there are roughly five white drug users for every one black drug user, it is incredible that nearly half of all people in state prison for drugs are black. This is an amazing criminal "justice" accomplishment. It is also a remarkable achievement of our culture that the strereotype of a drug dealer is a young black male, when it is fairly certain that at any given time the number of white dealers outnumbers the number of black dealers.
Dorm Room Dealers provides a view into this large and important but typically missing part of the story of illicit drug use in America. It shows how young, middle-class, white drug dealers manage to avoid prison and the stigma of drug dealing without even trying.
As mentioned above, the college-aged population has the highest rates of illicit drug use nationally. The students that the sociologists Mohamed and Fritsvold study do not challenge this finding. The campus drug dealers, if anything, struggle with the problem of having too many customers. Mohamed and Fritsvold report that among these white, middle-class college students,
The propensity for illicit drug use . . . was readily apparent in the seemingly unyielding demand for marijuana within this network. Throughout the course of the study, there was never a situation in which a drug dealer at any level was suffering from a customer shortage or had to actively seek out customers to support his or her illicit enterprise. Rather, on several occasions, we observed customers who were unable to locate an adequate supply of marijuana and were subsequently mired in the doldrums of "weed wait." (p. 20)Because of the strong demand for drugs, dorm-room dealing is an easy, low-risk and profitable enterprise for white, middle-class youth.
Dorm-room dealing is low-risk because white, middle-class youth are "anti-targets" in the "war on drugs." In other words, they are invisible to law enforcement because they do not fit the popular stereotype of a drug dealer, or their drug dealing is consciously ignored by collegiate authorities. Despite "selling large enough quantities of marijuana and other drugs to warrant serious stretches of incarceration under current drug-sentencing schemes" none of the thirty dealers the authors studied was ever incarcerated "even when people in positions of formal authority were clearly aware or otherwise suspected them of illegal drug trafficking" (p.34). The dorm room dealers operated almost completely in the open and with impunity.
. . . dealers carelessly operated out of their apartments or from on-campus housing. And, with few exceptions, the majority of their illegal business was on full display and in plain view upon walking through their front door. . . . [U]pon arrival to one of our interview and observation sessions with one of the largest dealers in the sample, it was noticed that ounces of marijuana, scales, large sums of cash, customers, and drug paraphernalia were visible from a relatively busy off-campus beach community street. (p. 138)One of the larger dealers, Brice, was particularly brazen:
[Brice] was momentarily detained at the checkpoint and asked by a Border Patrol officer, "You don't have any marijuana in there, do you?" Of course, as was usually the case with Brice, he did have pot in the car. However, almost amusingly and consistent with the notion that members of this affluent, primarily white drug network were anti-targets relatively immune from law enforcement scrutiny even when off of their home turf, Brice boldly replied, "I'm not that type of person." (p. 30)But Brice was, in fact, precisely the type of person who both uses marijuana heavily and sells large quantities of marijuana.
On numerous occasions since his graduation, police stopped Brice for speeding. During each of these stops, he was in possession of several pounds of marijuana and also, as was more typical than not for him, under the influence of the drug at the time. Nonetheless, and characteristic of the experiences of most of our dealers, during these stops, his vehicle was never searched, he was never asked to consent to a search, and he was never arrested. (p. 31)Thus, if one is white and middle class, one can be a significant drug user and dealer and be ignored by the "war on drugs."
While public law enforcement might be ignorant and oblivious to the dorm-room dealers, on-campus authorities are in many cases aware but choose to ignore the dealers' activities. On-campus authorities have strong incentives to go this route. For a university,
a major drug bust is bad for business in two significant ways. First, in a competitive climate where reputation is everything, drug arrests and publicly acknowledging the existence of an on-campus flourishing drug market clearly would not do much for short-term new student recruitment. Further, if students like LaCoste who come from well-to-do families were treated by university officials like garden variety corner boys, any endowment growth or other capital development plans specific to their families would most certainly be dashed. (p. 57)Universities run the risk of being hurt financially if they wage a war on the student drug trade. While there is an intense "war on drugs" off-campus, illicit drug use is in practice de-criminalized on campus.
Dorm Room Dealers is filled with insights about the white, middle-class drug trade and the many factors that make white, middle-class youth "anti-targets" in the war on drugs. One discovery completely surprised the authors. They did not realize how widespread the abuse of prescription drugs is. Students recklessly mixed different pills or took them with alcohol and, even after experiencing serious health episodes, did not seem to realize the danger they had put themselves in. One student reports his bad experiences with pharmaceuticals:
with uh Lamictal [a commonly prescribed drug for the treatment of bipolar disorder], if I drink on that I found out that I end up having seizures so I don't drink anymore on that. I've only done it twice and it's been a terrible, terrible situation. . . . Adderall, I've taken way too many of those before. That was bad news. I couldn't go to sleep for five days, that's not good for you. (p. 94)Prescription drug abuse is rising rapidly and it is already killing more people than crack cocaine did at crack's peak in the early 1990s. But students fail to realize that they are playing with a loaded gun.
Among 18-to-25 year olds, white youth are two-and-a-half times as likely as black youth to abuse prescription drugs. The abuse of drugs like OxyContin kill more people than crack cocaine and yet, as measured by the intensity of our policing and prosecution, our criminal justice system views crack cocaine as the greater harm to society. Mohamed and Fritsvold conclude,
when it comes to drug trafficking, there is substantial bias in the justice system based on, among other things, whether the offender is dealing in pharmaceuticals or street drugs. . . . [T]his disparity is not based on any objective assessment of social harm or threats to public well being. Rather, it is more likely that the types of people who are apt to be abusing and trafficking in pharmaceuticals do not fit the stereotypical drug dealer profile that has come from the war on drugs and are, therefore, regarded quite differently by lawmakers and the criminal justice system. (p. 93)Dorm Room Dealers shows from a new angle that our illicit drug policy needs comprehensive reform to make it more just and more effective at protecting the public.
Copyright © Algernon Austin 2010
11/22/2010
No Economic Recovery in Sight for Communities of Color
We are 7.5 million jobs below where we were at the start of the recession in December 2007. Since that time the labor market grew by about 3.5 million workers. Thus, to get back to where we were before the start of the recession we would need 11 million jobs.
For many communities of color, however, December 2007 was not a period of healthy labor market conditions. It was a typical period of relatively high joblessness. For people of color to experience an employment situation equivalent to whites in December 2007, they would need more jobs above the 11 million. Specifically, Latinos would need an additional 400,000 jobs to have an unemployment rate equal to whites in December 2007. Blacks would need about 2 million jobs to lift their low employment rate (or employment-to-population ratio) up to where it should be. American Indians would need about 200,000 jobs to lift their low employment rate up to a healthy rate. Thus, people of color need roughly 2.6 million jobs more on top of the 11 million for them to experience healthy economic conditions.
In total, therefore, we are nearly 14 million jobs short of a labor market that provides jobs for all communities equitably.
Sadly, few of our elected officials are behaving as if we are facing a massive jobs crisis. If job creation were number one on their agenda, we would be able to point to bold new initiatives for job creation. We cannot.
Last month the Bureau of Labor Statistics issued a report on people who have been unemployed for a year or more. Prior to Great Recession, someone who was unemployed for 6 months or more was considered to be unemployed for a long time. Now we can measure long-term unemployment in periods of 12 months or more.
In the second quarter of this year, there were 4.5 million people who were looking for work for a year or more. 3 million of them were white. One million were black. Three quarters of a million were Latinos. Two hundred thousand were Asian.
Asian Americans currently have the highest rates of long-term unemployment, just edging past blacks. Of all of the Asian Americans who were unemployed in the second quarter of this year, 39% were unemployed for a year or more. For African Americans it was 37%.
How much longer will these people have to go without work?
Wall Street has seen an economic recovery, when will Main Street see a real economic recovery?
What are our elected-officials’ plans for addressing this problem?
Right now, there are no answers to these questions.
By the first half of this year, several economists concluded that the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act had created over 2 million jobs. This job creation prevented the Great Recession from being a Great Depression. This job creation was vital, but we have not truly recovered yet.
We need about 14 million jobs to achieve full employment in all American communities—including communities of color. Without additional economic stimulus many millions will continue to look, month after month, for jobs that simply do not exist.
11/04/2010
Stopping the Decline of the Black Middle Class
For a brief moment in American history, one could argue that the majority of African Americans were middle class. That moment ended last year.
One definition of “middle class” used by social scientists is twice the poverty level. Individuals who live in households that have an income of at least two times the household’s federal poverty threshold are middle class. By this definition, in 1999 black America became a majority middle-class population. That year, 52.2% of blacks were middle class. Last year, the percent of middle-class blacks slipped down to 49.7%. There is every reason to expect further declines this year and next year.
College-educated blacks—another definition of “black middle class”—have been particularly hard hit during this recession. My organization, the Economic Policy Institute (EPI), estimates that this year the unemployment rate for black workers with bachelor’s or higher degrees is on track to be the highest since 1979, the earliest year for which we have data. In 2007, the unemployment rate for college-educated blacks was 1.6 times the rate for college-educated whites. This year it is 2 times the rate for college-educated whites.
If one restricts the focus to recent black college graduates, those under 25 years of age, the picture is similar but worse. Young, recent African-American college graduates had an unemployment rate of 15.4% in the first half of this year. Among recent college graduates, this group had the highest unemployment rate and the highest student-loan debt level. Jobless and burdened with over $30,000 worth of debt is a terrible way to begin one’s adult life, but this is the reality for many young and well-educated African Americans.
Wealth is another indicator that can be used to gauge the health of the black middle class. In 2004, 32.2% of black households had no wealth. EPI estimates that this percentage grew to 39.9% in 2009. In 2004, the median black wealth was a very modest $13,000. By 2009, it had fallen to $2,100. There has been a tremendous decline in wealth in black households likely due to the foreclosure crisis.
Whether one looks at income, wealth or the unemployment rate for the college-educated, the signs are of a black middle class in decline. What can be done?
The economic health of the black middle class is connected to the economic condition of blacks generally and to the health of the American labor force overall. The growth of the black middle class was the flipside of the strong decline in black poverty over the 1990s. We are not likely to see an American economy where black economic conditions improve dramatically without also an improvement in economic conditions for the country as a whole. Therefore, a necessary pre-condition for a strong and growing black middle class is a strong and growing American economy.
Unfortunately, many of the conservatives in Congress are promoting ideas that run the risk of stalling the already very weak economic recovery and accelerating the decline of the black middle class. For example, my colleagues at EPI estimated that Rep. John Boehner’s idea to extend the Bush tax cuts for all and cut domestic spending back to their 2008 level would cause the country to lose 1 million jobs. Policies of this sort will worsen economic conditions not improve them.
An economy where consumers are cutting their spending and businesses are aggressively cutting costs will not grow unless the federal government steps in with stimulus spending. The Recovery Act created over 2 million jobs, but we still have an 11-million-jobs deficit. We can’t create a healthy economy only through tax cuts. We tried this strategy during the George W. Bush administration, and we saw extremely weak job creation.
The federal government has one important option for job creation that can help the black middle class. State and local governments which are generally required to balance their budgets are seeing large fiscal deficits because of the recession. Many of these governments will respond to these deficits by cutting jobs. College-educated blacks are over-represented in state and local government. A large share of the jobs on the chopping block is likely to be black-middle-class jobs. The federal government can, however, provide aid to state and local governments to help reduce the job losses.
The federal government can also help black communities broadly by creating jobs programs as in did in response to the Great Depression. Federal jobs programs can be targeted to depressed communities where there has been a long-term scarcity of jobs. Many urban black communities fit this description.
The Great Recession has hit the black middle class hard. The fiscal crises in state and local government mean a continued loss of middle-class black jobs. The continuing foreclosure crisis means a continued loss of wealth among the black middle class. The black middle class will continue to decline unless the federal government steps in.
One definition of “middle class” used by social scientists is twice the poverty level. Individuals who live in households that have an income of at least two times the household’s federal poverty threshold are middle class. By this definition, in 1999 black America became a majority middle-class population. That year, 52.2% of blacks were middle class. Last year, the percent of middle-class blacks slipped down to 49.7%. There is every reason to expect further declines this year and next year.
College-educated blacks—another definition of “black middle class”—have been particularly hard hit during this recession. My organization, the Economic Policy Institute (EPI), estimates that this year the unemployment rate for black workers with bachelor’s or higher degrees is on track to be the highest since 1979, the earliest year for which we have data. In 2007, the unemployment rate for college-educated blacks was 1.6 times the rate for college-educated whites. This year it is 2 times the rate for college-educated whites.
If one restricts the focus to recent black college graduates, those under 25 years of age, the picture is similar but worse. Young, recent African-American college graduates had an unemployment rate of 15.4% in the first half of this year. Among recent college graduates, this group had the highest unemployment rate and the highest student-loan debt level. Jobless and burdened with over $30,000 worth of debt is a terrible way to begin one’s adult life, but this is the reality for many young and well-educated African Americans.
Wealth is another indicator that can be used to gauge the health of the black middle class. In 2004, 32.2% of black households had no wealth. EPI estimates that this percentage grew to 39.9% in 2009. In 2004, the median black wealth was a very modest $13,000. By 2009, it had fallen to $2,100. There has been a tremendous decline in wealth in black households likely due to the foreclosure crisis.
Whether one looks at income, wealth or the unemployment rate for the college-educated, the signs are of a black middle class in decline. What can be done?
The economic health of the black middle class is connected to the economic condition of blacks generally and to the health of the American labor force overall. The growth of the black middle class was the flipside of the strong decline in black poverty over the 1990s. We are not likely to see an American economy where black economic conditions improve dramatically without also an improvement in economic conditions for the country as a whole. Therefore, a necessary pre-condition for a strong and growing black middle class is a strong and growing American economy.
Unfortunately, many of the conservatives in Congress are promoting ideas that run the risk of stalling the already very weak economic recovery and accelerating the decline of the black middle class. For example, my colleagues at EPI estimated that Rep. John Boehner’s idea to extend the Bush tax cuts for all and cut domestic spending back to their 2008 level would cause the country to lose 1 million jobs. Policies of this sort will worsen economic conditions not improve them.
An economy where consumers are cutting their spending and businesses are aggressively cutting costs will not grow unless the federal government steps in with stimulus spending. The Recovery Act created over 2 million jobs, but we still have an 11-million-jobs deficit. We can’t create a healthy economy only through tax cuts. We tried this strategy during the George W. Bush administration, and we saw extremely weak job creation.
The federal government has one important option for job creation that can help the black middle class. State and local governments which are generally required to balance their budgets are seeing large fiscal deficits because of the recession. Many of these governments will respond to these deficits by cutting jobs. College-educated blacks are over-represented in state and local government. A large share of the jobs on the chopping block is likely to be black-middle-class jobs. The federal government can, however, provide aid to state and local governments to help reduce the job losses.
The federal government can also help black communities broadly by creating jobs programs as in did in response to the Great Depression. Federal jobs programs can be targeted to depressed communities where there has been a long-term scarcity of jobs. Many urban black communities fit this description.
The Great Recession has hit the black middle class hard. The fiscal crises in state and local government mean a continued loss of middle-class black jobs. The continuing foreclosure crisis means a continued loss of wealth among the black middle class. The black middle class will continue to decline unless the federal government steps in.
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