Discrimination, not illegal immigration, fuels Black job crisis
Discrimination, not illegal immigration, fuels Black job crisis
By Earl Ofari Hutchinson
Updated May 10, 2006, 08:56 am
http://www.finalcall.com/artman/uplo...documented.jpgProtesters gather alongside Thomas Road and 36th Street on May 1 in Phoenix, Ariz., as part of a nationwide boycott intended to show how vital immigrants are to the American economy. Immigrants were encouraged not to work or spend any money on May 1st. Photo: AP/World Wide Photos
The battle continues to rage between economists, politicians, immigrant rights activists and Black anti-immigration activists over whether illegal immigrants are the major cause of double-digit joblessness among poor, unskilled, young Black males. The battle lines are so tight and impassioned that Black anti-immigration activists planned a march for jobs for American-born Blacks on Apr. 28 in Los Angeles. This is a direct counter to the planned mass action three days later by some immigrant rights groups.
According to Labor Department reports, nearly 40 percent of young Black males are unemployed. Despite the Bush administration’s boast that its tax cut and economic policies have resulted in the creation of more than 100,000 new jobs, Black unemployment still remains the highest of any group in America. Black male unemployment for the past decade has been nearly double that of White males. The picture is grimmer for young Black males.
But several years before the immigration combatants squared off, then-University of Wisconsin graduate researcher Devah Pager pointed the finger in another direction, a direction that makes most employers squirm—and that’s toward the persistent and deep racial discrimination in the workplace. Ms. Pager found that Black men without a criminal record are less likely to find a job than White men with criminal records.
Her finger-point at discrimination as the main reason for the racial disparity in hiring set off howls of protest from employers, trade groups and even a Nobel Prize winner. They lambasted her for faulty research. Her sample was much too small, they said, and the questions too vague. They pointed to the ocean of state and federal laws that ban racial discrimination. But in 2005 Ms. Pager, now a sociologist at Princeton, duplicated her study. She surveyed nearly 1,500 private employers in New York City, using teams of Black and White testers, standardized resumes and follow-up visits with telephone interviews with employers. These are the standard methods researchers use to test racial discrimination. The results were exactly the same as in her earlier study, despite the fact that New York has some of the nation’s toughest laws against job discrimination.
Dumping the blame for the chronic job crisis of young, poor Black men on undocumented immigrants stokes the passions and hysteria of immigration reform opponents, but it also lets employers off the hook for discrimination. And it’s easy to see how that could happen. The mountain of federal and state anti-discrimination laws, affirmative action programs and successful employment discrimination lawsuits give the public the impression that job discrimination is a relic of a shameful, racist past. But that isn’t the case, and Ms. Pager’s study is hardly isolated proof of that.
Countless research studies, the Urban League’s annual State of Black America report, a 2005 Human Rights Watch report and the numerous discrimination complaints reviewed by the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission over the past decade reveal that employers have devised endless dodges to evade anti-discrimination laws. That includes rejecting applicants by their names or areas of the city they live in. Black applicants may be incorrectly told that jobs advertised were filled already.
In a seven-month comprehensive university study of the hiring practices of hundreds of Chicago area employers, a few years before Ms. Pager’s graduate study, many top company officials when interviewed said they would not hire Blacks. When asked to assess the work ethic of White, Black and Latino employees by race, nearly 40 percent of the employers ranked Blacks dead last. The employers routinely described Blacks as being “unskilled,” “uneducated,” “illiterate,” “dishonest,” “lacking initiative,” “involved with gangs and drugs” or “unstable,” of having “no family values” and being “poor role models.”
The consensus among these employers was that Blacks brought their alleged pathologies to the work place, and were to be avoided at all costs. Not only White employers express such views; researchers found that Black business owners shared many of the same negative attitudes. Other surveys have found that a substantial number of non-White business owners also refuse to hire Blacks. Their bias effectively closed out another area of employment to thousands of Blacks, solely based on their color. This only tells part of the sorry job picture for many poor Blacks.
The Congressional Black Caucus reports that at least half of all unemployed Black workers have been out of work for a year or more. Many have given up looking for work. The Census does not count them among the unemployed. The dreary job picture for the unskilled and marginally skilled urban poor, especially the Black poor, is compounded by the racially skewed attitudes of small and large employers. Even if there was not a single illegal immigrant in America, that attitude insures that many Black job seekers would still find themselves shut out.
A Respectful Black-Hispanic Coalition
A Respectful Black-Hispanic Coalition
By Ron Walters
May 29, 2006
In between the reticence of the Black leadership to fully discuss the problem of immigration, especially as it affects the demands of the Hispanic population and the resentment of their constituents to those demands, is the necessity to consider rationally the content of an agenda that will unite the potential power of both.
Thus far, the voices of civil rights and political leaders are either stilled or in in support of a progressive approach to immigration that does not take into consideration the resentment of the rank and file Black working class. Their acknowledgment of the civil and human rights of Hispanics, is therefore, considered one-sided and incomplete by many of their constituents. My task then, is to propose measures that would construct the other side of the agenda, so that the progressive content of Black support for the Hispanic mobilization could be respectful of Black interests as well.
To begin with, Blacks should strongly support the current mobilization of Hispanics for measures that would result in the legalization of their status as workers and citizens, whether that proposed in the Kennedy - McCain bill or the Bush proposals, or by some other process. But public opinion polling also indicates that Blacks favor limiting further illegal immigration, though one would doubt by the means proposed by Bush that favors militarizing the U. S. border.
In exchange for Black support. However, there are three consideration that might be addressed to the Hispanic community:
First, limiting further illegal, low-wage labor should not be focused on criminalizing those who cross the border, but those who provide the incentive for them to come. Employers are practicing racial discrimination against Blacks in the labor market, which was prohibited by the 1964 Civil Rights Act, Title VII. Blacks are excluded from work opportunity by employers seeking low-wage workers, and since in the process, they sanction the exclusion of Blacks from the labor force, as such, should be prosecuted for such violations.
Second, Hispanic managers who procure workers should be made sensitive to the necessity - and legality - to secure Black workers. In some areas, I have seen them include Black workers as a part of groups they hire for jobs in hotels, restaurants, construction or other day jobs, but not frequently. More often, such managers are part of the system of racial segregation of the labor groups delivered to employers.
Third, Hispanic laborers should push for higher wages and benefits through unionization. A great model exists in the efforts of the Service Employers International Union (SEIU), a group that has enrolled thousands of Hispanic service workers. Hispanics could re-energize the American labor movement if they take the new-found courage to protest and demonstrate, not only into the ballot box, but into the labor halls as well.
Fourth, Hispanic leaders and civic activists should organize their constituents into a new force for state campaigns to achieve living wage and minimum wage legislation, where such legislation has been blocked on a national level. This could also assist Blacks and other low-wage populations to enter jobs at wages that, though they may not be sufficient, would more effectively contribute to family budgets and consequently to the viability of their members.
The stakes of developing a respectful coalition between Blacks and Hispanics is that rank-and-file Blacks who are resentful of Hispanic gains could be brought along if they see them fighting for a common agenda that lifts their own access to opportunity. But leadership is necessary in crafting such an agenda, not in denying that a problem exists. Leadership is vital because the stakes in developing an strong and effective coalition based an agenda, respectful of both interests are so high.
For example, right now, in the fight against poverty, the welfare program, known in most states as the Temporary Assistance to Needy Families program, has essentially pushed off most of 52 percent of former welfare clients into low-wage jobs. They are trapped in such jobs, or loose them to others competing for the same jobs and neither group is the beneficiary of a system that gets them out of poverty. But if the actions are taken above, both sets of workers could play a powerful role in lifting Blacks coming off of welfare into jobs, and those Hispanics competing with them, out of poverty.
Speaking of the political stakes, I continue to emphasize the point that Blacks and Hispanics constitute 25-30 percent of the population in 13 states and that those states represent 43 percent of the electoral vote for president. But that power is potential at the moment because Hispanics vote at about half the level of Blacks (11 percent to 6 percent) in national elections. When they begin to vote at the same level of Blacks, perhaps in the not too distant future, the combination will constitute one quarter of the American electorate.
The increase in the Hispanic vote between 1998 and 2002 was 10 percent. If that continues, as is likely from the mobilizations taking place, it could match the turnout of Blacks this fall. And if the Bush administration's favorable numbers are still low, Black and Hispanic voters could contribute to an electoral psunami that would change the politics of government and make possible many of the policies that they need.
The message here is two-fold. Black leaders need to both support the Hispanic mobilization more forcefully and from the perspective of the interests of their community, especially those who are most affected by the growing presence of the Hispanic population. In this, they must help to craft a respectful agenda that is the glue of a strong and effective coalition.
Then, as the Hispanic mobilization continues, it needs to consider expanding its agenda. I am aware of the debate within that community over this tactics, but it should not be considered just a tactic, but a grand strategy for achieving long-term objectives. It may be that in the urgency of the moment, a narrow agenda is best to fuel organizing, but at some point soon, Hispanics should join ranks with the low-wage American working class and push hard in the direction of change. In this respect, the demand for citizenship has a price.
Ron Walters is the Distinguished Leadership Scholar, Director of the African American Leadership Institute and Professor of Government and Politics at the University of Maryland College Park. His latest books are: White Nationalism, Black Interests (Wayne State University Press) and Freedom Is Not Enough (Rowman and Littlefield).
