Stratification Economics: Context Versus Culture and the Reparations Controversy

This is the published version

Latinos, African Americans and the Coalitional Case for a Federal Jobs Program

In the late 1970s, amidst growing unemployment in black and Latino communities, the newly-formed Congressional Hispanic Caucus (CHC) supported the Congressional Black Caucus (CBC) in its call for full employment in the run up to the passage of the Humphrey-Hawkins Act of 1 978. Never fully implemented, the act has been de facto an unfunded mandate for close to 40 years. Only recently has it been resurrected by a handful of lawmakers, while both discussion and support for a national jobs program has begun to gain steam in the media and the general public. With support from labor market research and other empirical evidence, we propose and outline for a bold policy: a National Investment Employment Corps to provide a permanent job guarantee for all citizens with the purpose of maintaining and expanding the nation\u27s physical and human infrastructure. Given the disproportionate effect of the recent economic downturn and labor market bias on African Americans and Latinos, we argue that a National Investment Employment Corps program would address the employment needs for blacks and Latinos by assuring full-employment and simultaneously ensuring long-term benefits for the nation\u27s well-being

Evidence on Discrimination in Employment: Codes of Color, Codes of Gender

There is substantial racial and gender disparity in the American economy. As we will demonstrate, discriminatory treatment within the labor market is a major cause of this inequality. Yet, there appear to have been particular periods in which racial minorities, and then women, experienced substantial reductions in economic disparity and discrimination. Some questions remain: Why did the movement toward racial equality stagnate after the mid-1970s? What factors are most responsible for the remaining gender inequality? What is the role of the competitive process in elimination or reproduction of discrimination in employment? How successful has the passage of federal antidiscrimination legislation in the 1960s been in producing an equal opportunity environment where job applicants are now evaluated on their qualifications? To give away the answer at the outset, discrimination by race has diminished somewhat, and discrimination by gender has diminished substantially; neither employment discrimination by race or by gender is close to ending. The Civil Rights Act of 1964 and subsequent related legislation has purged American society of the most overt forms of discrimination, while discriminatory practices have continued in more covert and subtle forms. Furthermore, racial discrimination is masked and rationalized by widely-held presumptions of black inferiority

The state of blacks in higher education

This is a study initiated by the National Association for Equal Opportunity in Higher Education (NAFEO) that provides an overview on the state of blacks in higher education from 1986 through 2005. It focuses on bachelor’s, master’s, and doctorate degrees earned by black Americans. It also examines the advancement, or lack thereof, of black faculty members. The study uses data from the Integrated Postsecondary Education Data Series and the Survey of Doctorial Recipients.blacks; higher education;

The Tapestry of Black Business Ownership in America: Untapped Opportunities for Success

This groundbreaking report explores the diversity among Black business owners in the U.S. and illuminates several key findings about the important role that Black-owned businesses have played in the U.S. economy, and the expanded role they could play given the right support

Beyond Broke: Why Closing the Racial Wealth Gap is a Priority for National Economic Security

Despite overwhelming evidence that the racial wealth gap persists in the U.S., it remains a taboo topic in mainstream policy circles and most officials studiously avoid offering targeted solutions to help close this gap. However, this issue is ignored at our nation's peril given the anticipated growth of racial and ethnic groups over the next few decades.This report uses the most recently available data from the U. S. Census Bureau's Survey of Income and Program Participation (SIPP) along with the National Asset Scorecard in Communities of Color (NASCC) in order to highlight the current state of America's racial wealth gap. With these tools, we provide an in-depth analysis of housing wealth and liquid wealth, while also evaluating how wealth disparities manifest across racial and ethnic categories and within racial and ethnic subpopulations in four geographically diverse U.S. cities

Racial Differences In the Effect of Marriageable Males On Female Family Headship

Female family headship has strong implications for endemic poverty in the United States. Consequently, it is imperative to explore the chief factors that contribute to this problem. Departing from prior literature that places significant weight on welfare-incentive effects, our study highlights the role of male marriageability in explaining the prevalence of never-married female family headship for blacks and whites. Specifically, we examine racial differences in the effect of male marriageability on never-married female headship from 1980 to 2010. By exploiting data from IPUMS-USA (N = 4,958,722) and exogenous variation from state-level sentencing reforms, the study finds that the decline in the relative supply of marriageable males significantly increases the incidence of never-married female family headship for blacks but not for whites

Keynes' Political Philosophy: The Gesell Connection

Karl Marx perhaps the most astute student of economic doctrine, once made the famous and apposite observation that in substantial passages of "The Wealth of Nations" Adam Smith "was very copiously infected with the conceptions of the Physiocrats." In parallel fashion this paper agues that in substantial portions of "The General Theory," J. M. Keynes was a mere Gesellist, particularly but not uniquely, in his expressions of political philosophy vis-a-vis the relationship between state and economy.