Unemployment for Black Male College Graduates Almost Double That of Whites

Monday, December 07, 2009

President Barack Obama’s breaking of the color barrier in presidential politics notwithstanding, many African-American men continue to struggle against racial inequalities in the job market, even for graduating from the nation’s top colleges. According to data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, black male college graduates over 25 years of age are enduring unemployment at almost twice the rate of their white counterparts (8.4% vs. 4.4%). Some black men interviewed by The New York Times said they have removed information from their resumes that might indicate their ethnicity to a potential employer, reinforcing the conclusions of a study published several years ago in The American Economic Review (Are Emily and Greg More Employable than Lakisha and Jamal?) that found applicants with black-sounding names received 50% fewer callbacks than those with white-sounding names.

-Noel Brinkerhoff
 

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