Black unemployment numbers don’t improve, Black teen unemployment hits crisis levels
Your Black World
The unemployment picture for the Black community remains bleak, as it has been for the last five years since the start of the 2008 recession. Data on the seasonally-adjusted unemployment rate continue to show few signs of improvements of the economic conditions of African Americans. Black unemployment made a slight drop for the month of April, from 13.3 percent to 13.2 percent. This number is nearly twice as high as white unemployment, which stands at a relatively comfortable 6.7 percent.
Black males have the highest unemployment rate in the country, at 12.6 percent. This is a slight drop from last month, which was 12.7 percent. Black women saw a steep drop in unemployment, from 12.2 percent to 11.6 percent. But things have gotten worse for Black women over the past year; Seasonally-adjusted unemployment for April 2012 was 10.7 for Black women and has risen since that time.
The overall Black unemployment rate appears to be getting dragged down by Black teens, who are unable to find jobs. The unemployment rate for Black teenagers was an astonishing 40.5 percent in April, rising from 33.5 percent the month before. White teens, on the other hand, have 21.8 percent unemployment.
Some have attributed the spike in Black teen unemployment as a cause of the violence in urban communities. The National Urban League and other organizations have called on Washington politicians to issue a New Deal for urban America to revitalize struggling communities who’ve been hit the hardest from the economic downturn.
