Plight Deepens for Black Men, Studies Warn (NYT) [View All]

(I blame the Prison Industrial Complex for this.)

Plight Deepens for Black Men, Studies Warn

By ERIK ECKHOLM
Published: March 20, 2006

BALTIMORE — Black men in the United States face a far more dire situation than is portrayed by common employment and education statistics, a flurry of new scholarly studies warn, and it has worsened in recent years even as an economic boom and a welfare overhaul have brought gains to black women and other groups.

Focusing more closely than ever on the life patterns of young black men, the new studies, by experts at Columbia, Princeton, Harvard and other institutions, show that the huge pool of poorly educated black men are becoming ever more disconnected from the mainstream society, and to a far greater degree than comparable white or Hispanic men.



Especially in the country's inner cities, the studies show, finishing high school is the exception, legal work is scarcer than ever and prison is almost routine, with incarceration rates climbing for blacks even as urban crime rates have declined.

Although the problems afflicting poor black men have been known for decades, the new data paint a more extensive and sobering picture of the challenges they face. "There's something very different happening with young black men, and it's something we can no longer ignore," said Ronald B. Mincy, professor of social work at Columbia University and editor of "Black Males Left Behind" (Urban Institute Press, 2006)....

(more at link below)

<http://www.nytimes.com/2006/03/20/national/20blackmen.html?ex=1300510800&en=d19e7818ebcbc179&ei=5088&partner=rssnyt&emc=rss>