The Patriot Post® · Do Black Jobs Matter?

The numbers in the Bureau of Labor Statistics’ August jobs report were disheartening. Economists hoped the economy had added 220,000 jobs in August. Instead, it added 173,000. Sure, the unemployment rate slid down 0.2 points to 5.1%, but the number disguised an untold tale of two economies, one for whites and the other for black America. The unemployment rate for white workers was at 4.4% for August, a drop of 0.2 points from July. But the unemployment rate for black workers is more than double that at 9.5%. And that’s up from 9.1% In July. While white workers were hired and returned to work in this struggling economy, black workers essentially face the same unemployment rate as they did before the Obama “recovery” began — 10.1% in 2008. Democrats can pontificate about how black lives matter and how policing needs to change, but for lasting change to occur blacks lives need black jobs. Could it be that the educational system has failed to prepare millions of workers for the shifts in the national and global economy? One thing’s clear: The Left’s policies are the wrong solution. The promise of raising the minimum wage — thus raising the cost for employers to add more jobs — on top of the influx of low-skilled labor through lax immigration enforcement endangers the job security of this struggling demographic and key Democrat constituency. Will blacks notice?