Chicago's black male teens' 92 percent unemployment rate leads nation
Chicago : IL : USA | Jan 21, 2014 at 6:00 AM PST
allvoices.com
According to a just released report by the Chicago Urban League, unemployment for black male teens in Chicago has reached not quite 100 percent.
The actual number is 92 percent, as reported by MyFoxChicago. Looked at from the other end, of course, this means that only 8 percent of all black male youth in Chicago have a job, any kind of job.
The Urban League blames the paucity of jobs in the city on two basic and inter-related factors:
- Traditional “adult” jobs in light-to-heavy industrial plants and factories have long been outsourced to cheaper and non-union labor markets mainly in the South and Southwest (“right-to-work” states) or out of the country altogether to Mexico, China, Southeast Asia, etc., where workers are paid from a few pennies to a very few dollarsper day -- and where there are also no pesky unions, work safety rules, child labor laws, etc., ad infinitum.
- Adults are now taking the once "traditional" jobs that were available mainly to teens (fast food workers, “entry-level” retail jobs – Walmart, Target, i.e., -- washing cars, delivery jobs, even paper routes, etc.).The Urban League study indicates that 17 percent of black males between the ages of 16 and 19 had jobs throughout the US. But, in Illinois, that number was only 12 percent. And, as stated, the Windy City clocks in with only 8 percent of black male teens with jobs.
Obviously this is a major economic crisis -- an emergency -- for Chicago. And, as any college sophomore sociology or political science student will tell you, high rates of joblessness correspond and track directly, almost seamlessly as a major – if not the major – factor in high rates of violence in this or any other city.
“We do the studies because I don’t think most people realize how bad the problem is and understand why this should be a priority issue. They think, 'Oh, summer jobs for kids. That’s a nice thing.' It’s not a 'nice thing.' It’s a required thing,” President of the Chicago Urban League Andrea Zopp, reported dnainfo.com/chicago.... |
