Nearly half of young black men in Chicago out of work, out of school

It's pretty incredible that this situation can exist when we have a national unemployment rate of 5%.

Forty-seven percent of 20- to 24-year-old black men in Chicago, and 44 percent in Illinois, were out of school and out of work in 2014, compared with 20 percent of Hispanic men and 10 percent of white men in the same age group, according to the report from the University of Illinois at Chicago's Great Cities Institute.

The numbers for black men are far worse in Chicago and Illinois than elsewhere in the country. In Los Angeles and New York City, 31 percent of black 20- to 24-year-old men were out of school and out of work, in line with the national average of 32 percent.

While declines in youth employment across all races have raised concerns for a number of years, the new report puts into stark focus the connection between unemployment and Chicago's racially segregated neighborhoods that also are home to high rates of poverty and crime.

The report shows the highest concentration of youth unemployment is in neighborhoods on the city's South and West sides, especially Fuller Park, Englewood, East Garfield Park and North Lawndale, each of which is more than 90 percent black. The lowest concentration is in mostly white neighborhoods on the North and Northwest sides.

"Conditions of joblessness are chronic, concentrated and comparatively worse than elsewhere in the country," said Teresa Cordova, director of the Great Cities Institute. She called the prevalence of jobless among black males "definitely at crisis proportions."

The report, commissioned by the Alternative Schools Network and based on census data, was presented Monday at the fifth annual hearing on youth unemployment, hosted by the Chicago Urban League at its headquarters in Bronzeville.

Nearly half of young black men in Chicago out of work, out of school: report

 

But why?

 

They're all waiting for acceptance into med school?

 

Local problem, local solutions.

 

They should just start computer companies. Steve Jobs and Bill Gates didn't need no stinkin' college to start computer companies.

 

If only there was someone to organize the community. Someone who might one day rise up to a position of power and turn a laser focus on the problems of his hometown in front of a national audience.

 

Of course if he did that there wouldn't be a hurricane of pissing and moaning over "favoritism" and "reverse racism."

Of course, of course.

Trying to think: who was the last POTUS to put high priority on legislative and policy initiatives in his home state? Maybe LBJ, I suppose. Although relocating NASA in Houston was already in the works before he succeeded JFK.
The point remains, modern presidents don't focus much attention on their home states; it's considered bad form and doesn't help in reelection.

 

Think we need Whitman to weigh in here. We all want it. We all know we want it.

 

I'm planning to not vote or do my job so I can be a neutral arbiter of the whole political process and tell it like it really is.

 

I get all my news from unhinged (agate clerks/Internet message board entrepreneurs) on message boards. Did you hear about this Lena Dunham character?

 

Oh my god, Meta Dick is my new favorite Dick.

 

It's possible I'm pulling an Amy Schumer here and subconsciously stealing someone else's material.