There’s been very little good news in unemployment figures released by the Bureau of Labor Statistics in the last few months.
But the unemployment crisis has been particularly hard on minority communities. Earlier this year, White House economic adviser Austan Goolsbee, called the minority unemployment rate “shockingly and totally unacceptably high.”
Whether it be the jobs crisis, the foreclosure epidemic or the our nation’s vast prison population, there is a growing sense that minority unemployment has hit crisis levels in some areas of the country. Check out Huffington Post’s round-up of some of the most shocking statistics about minority unemployment across America.
7. Black Unemployment Is Double The Rate Of White Unemployment
6. The Racial Unemployment Gap Continues To Widen
According to data released by the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the Black unemployment rate has steadily risen every year since 2008.Since (Sept 2008) the black unemployment rate has jumped from 11.2 percent to 15.9 percent this year.
Along that same period, however, the white unemployment rate has actually gone down. In September of 2008, the white unemployment rate was 8.6 percent, but had fallen to 8.3 percent by September of 2010.
In September 2008 Hispanic unemployment stood at 7.6 percent, but jumped to 12.2 percent one year later. By September 2010 the rate fell to 11.9 percent.
5. Unemployment Statistics Don’t Count The 2.3 Million People In Jail
There are 2.3 million people behind bars that are not accounted for in national unemployment statistics, according to the recent study Collateral Costs: Incarcerations Effect On Economic Mobility Incarceration.
For young men (aged 20 to 34), 1.8 percent of whites, 3.7 percent of Hispanics and 11.4 percent of blacks are currently incarcerated. And, the study found, incarceration depresses the total earnings of white males by 2 percent, Hispanics by 6 percent and and blacks by 9 percent upon their release.
4. The Foreclosure Crisis Has Hit Black Communities Harder
The foreclosure crisis has intensified among blacks, a recent study found. When a community houses slightly more blacks than the nation as a whole, the foreclosure rate increases by 1.68 percentage points.
As HuffPost’s William Alden reported last month: “Among lenders that went bankrupt in 2007, blacks were three times more likely than whites to receive subprime loans, according to a previous study that the authors cite in their report. Among lenders that did not go bankrupt, blacks were equally as likely as whites to receive “predatory” treatment.”
3. In Certain Cities, Minority Unemployment Is Hitting Crisis Levels
According to a June report by the Economic Policy Institute , which examined 2009 data, the Detroit metro area has the highest black unemployment rate at 20.9 percent. In Detroit, the white unemployment rate is 13.8 percent.
Next, the Minneapolis-St. Paul area has a black unemployment rate of 20.4 percent and a white unemployment rate of 6.6 percent.
Then St. Louis, Missouri region has a black unemployment rate of 17.3 percent and a white unemployment rate of 8.4 percent.
Hispanic unemployment rates are also highest in Riverside-San Bernardino, Ca (17.3 percent) and Las Vegas-Paradise, Nv (17.2 percent)
2. College-Educated Blacks Still Have Higher Unemployment Rates
As CNNMoney reported, the unemployment rate for black male college graduates 25 and older stood at 7.8 percent as of August.
For white male college graduates over 25, the unemployment rate is 4.4 percent.
1. Minority Teens Have Been Hit Hard
Bureau of Labor Statistics’ data reveals some shocking data about teen unemployment by race. 49.1 percent of black teens are unemployed, a rate that’s 26 percentage points higher than the unemployment rate for white teens and 10 percentage points higher than the rate for Hispanic teens.