Black Job Loss D?j? Vu

The 'Great Migration,' in which millions of black people left the South to take factory jobs in the North and the Midwest, was a pillar of black employment. In the 1970s, these same people were laid off in droves as their jobs were shifted overseas or back to the low-paying, nonunion South. History is now repeating itself, with the 2001 recession hurting black workers more than any previous recession. Moreover, African Americans are feeling the pain of unemployment much more than their white counterparts, with black unemployment rising twice as fast as white unemployment.

With fewer assets and resources to sustain them during hard times, African American families are often hit harder by unemployment than their white counterparts. Laid-off black factory workers also have a harder time finding new jobs, which are often located in the public-transportation-inaccessible suburbs. Pervasive housing discrimination and segregation prevent relocation, and some employers have even admitted to relocating to the suburbs to avoid black workers.

The media have been reluctant to cover this facet of the employment crisis, choosing instead to focus on white workers losing jobs in the technical sector. Like the current unemployment problems, this disparity in media representation has happened before. In 1968, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. said, 'When there is massive unemployment in the black community, it is called a social problem. But when there is massive unemployment in the white community, it is called a depression.'