Black unemployment versus living off assets

BLS graph of black unemployment

I recently got a call from my mortgage company, and they wanted to know whether we were paying our mortgage from paycheck funds or investment interest funds. This question took me by surprise. That's when it dawned on me that this whole full employment thing, this notion that job creation will help the middle class, is a hoax. 

RICH FOLKS DON'T WORK TO LIVE, THEY LIVE OFF THEIR INVESTMENTS! They don't have a problem borrowing money to start new businesses or send their kids to college because they know banks will let them get whatever they need for as long as they need it.

If I had forty acres, a mule, and an apartment building to lease, maybe I would not have to worry about employment either!

No, I'm not crazy. Problem is that blacks historically have been just a few paychecks away from being broke. White colonists who became wealthy did so by amassing assets (slaves, guns, horses and livestock) and stealing and maintaining ill-gotten lands from Native Americans. They were not highly educated, but shrewd and diabolical. Many were not hard working, but knew how to work others hard without giving them adequate food, funds, or futures. Many were master crooks.

Recently I read a scathing piece written by Republican political analyst Raynard Jackson who claims that blacks are psychologicall inept for supporting President Obama. (http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/therootdc/post/obama-the-democratic-national-convention-and-african-americans-talking-loud-and-saying-nothing/2012/09/05/74d8c6be-f78e-11e1-8253-3f495ae70650_blog.html)

Jackson claims that black unemployment under Obama has increased, therefore, blacks should not vote for him. Let's take an historical perspective on black unemployment.

Writer Andy Kroll postulates that over a 60 year period, black unemployment has historically been much higher than white unemployment, according to Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) data . Additionally, under the Republican savior, President Reagan, black unemployment peaked at 20.7 percent.

On the Media Matters for America blog, it was noted that "the increase in the black unemployment rate during the recession was larger than that for other races partly because workers with less education are particularly hard hit during recessions. Moreover, the unemployment rate for Blacks was slower to fall after the official end of the recession. The slower recovery for African Americans in the labor market has been partly the result of government layoffs after the official end of the recession."

Guess what? When you reduce taxes and run huge deficits, you have less money to hire and have to layoff workers.  Media Matters states that, "In 2011, nearly 20 percent of employed Blacks worked for state, local, or federal government compared to 14.2 percent of Whites and 10.4 percent of Hispanics." When governments have no money, blacks have no jobs.

As I see it, black unemployment is high because we're still the "last hired, first fired." After WWII and before the civil rights movement fully integrated businesses, blacks had jobs because they made them for themselves. Now we're always looking for a job. Perhaps the only way we will be able to turn this black unemployment crisis around is to learn to program robots to solve our problems!

Before that happens, though, if you don't have assets to live on, you must find a job, even if it's at slave wages.

Perhaps we should not be concentrating on getting J.O.B.S, but on obtaining assets that will pay our debts. Remember, Romney does not work --- he lives off his assets. Rich folks use work as a power past time that offers huge psychological and philanthropic benefits.

My stepfather once gave me this advice: "Save your income and live off your interest." When you're close to being broke, this is impossible. That's why some blacks are so far behind.
©2012 Tomi Johnson. All rights reserved