[PEN-L:601] re underemployment

[eugenecoyle@xxxxxxxxxxx (Eugene P. Coyle)]

This is something re unemployment that the Baltimore Sun published back
when George Bush was still President.
        Maybe I was too critical -- those folks in prison are all getting
their Ph. D.s at the expense of those who played by the rules.  (Who talks
about playing by the rules?)

        Gene Coyle


The Army, a job or prison for young black men?

        by Eugene P. Coyle

        The terrible job market black men face was brought into public
focus by the war in the Persian Gulf.  25% of the US military force in the
Gulf are blacks,1 a rate double the black share of the population.
Explanations for this range from the "patriotism" asserted by President
Bush to the liberals' claim that it is "? their only chance for
advancement."  Neither explanation is credible when we look at the facts.
For most black enlistees military service is their only chance for a job,
never mind advancement.  The brutal truth is that for many it may be their
only chance for survival outside of prison.

        The 1990 unemployment rate for African American males aged 20 to 24
years was 20.2%.2  (The comparable rate for whites was 8.1%.)  The official
unemployment statistics would be dreadful enough, but the numbers hide the
reality these men face.  The Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) definitions
of unemployment are notorious for understating by half-- for whites as well
as blacks -- the real extent of the hardship in finding jobs.

        For African Americans another factor conceals how desperate the
situation is:  an astonishing 12% of those men in their twenties and not in
the military are in jail or prison.3  It is reasonable to say that the
policy during the Reagan-Bush years is to warehouse black unemployed men in
prisons, rather than to run the economy in a way that would put people to
work.

        A straightforward calculation of black men in the prime work years
of 20 - 24 shows that the number unemployed is more than 30% higher than
the reported BLS figures.  Historically the growth in the prison population
has been 2.2% per year.4  But during the Reagan-Bush decade the inmate
population grew by 10.3% annually, to about a million and a quarter,
including about 558,000 black men.  If the historical growth had continued
in the '80's, about 300,000 fewer black men would have been incarcerated in
1990.  If men in the community can't find jobs, it is clear that no jobs
are available for the men now in prison.  Adding the portion of the "extra"
black males in the 20 - 24 age bracket to the officially unemployed raises
that group's unemployment rate to 26.4%.

        This still significantly understates the misery.  Both white and
black unemployment is minimized by the BLS statistics.  Not counted as
unemployed are those not looking for work, realistically believing there is
none to be found.  Not counted are those preferring to be called retired
rather than unemployed, though they'd jump at a chance to re-enter the work
force.  These are predominantly middle-aged white men, involuntarily
disappearing from the labor force.  Part-timers wanting full time jobs,
even those working as little as one hour in a week, are called employed,
not unemployed.    The homeless don't and can't enter the statistics at
all, because the BLS samples at randomly picked homes.  It is likely that
the homeless are unemployed at a rate higher than the housed.

        The BLS itself makes alternative calculations to measure some of
these omissions.  The data for BLS adjustments are not disaggregated by
race and age, so that a strict comparison can't be made.  It is clear,
however, that reflecting all the unemployed young black men of an age to
start careers and families, men who would work if it were available, would
boost unemployment rate for the 20 to 24 year olds to the neighborhood of
30% or more.  Keep in mind, furthermore, that the unemployment numbers here
are chronic, raised only slightly by the current recession.

        Against this background to call African American military
enlistments "voluntary" is to encourage self-deception in the rest of us.
An American President who explains a racially distorted enlistment rate by
calling it "patriotism" is a President betraying men he sent to the front
lines.  A government spending over 1.1 billion dollars a year* building
prisons while simultaneously running the economy in a way that fills the
prisons and not jobs is a government not fit to lead.  An economy unable to
employ its people is sick, but not as sick as a government that hides that
fact behind prison walls.

1 NY Times, 2/26/91, Andrew Rosenthal, citing Defense Dept. Statistics.
2 Employment And Earnings, January 1991, U. S. Department of Labor, Bureau
of Labor Statistics, Table 3, page 166.
3   Calculation by the author.  See worksheets.
4   Calculated from Historical Statistics on Prisoners in State and Federal
Institutions, Yearend 1925-86, U. S. Dept. of Justice, Bureau of Justice
Statistics.  1925-1980 compound annual growth rate, 2.2%.
* Construction cost in 1989 was $1,110,410,503.  From Corrections Yearbook,
1990, Criminal Justice Institute, South Salem, New York.