Nearly half of young black men in Chicago out of work, out of school: report, By Alexia Elejalde-Ruiz, January 25, 2016, Chicago Tribune: “Nearly half of young black men in Chicago are neither in school nor working, a staggering statistic in a bleak new youth unemployment report that shows Chicago to be far worse off than its big-city peers. To 24-year-old Johnathan Allen, that’s no surprise. ‘It’s right there in your face, you don’t need statistics,’ Allen said as he testified before a room full of lawmakers and public officials Monday at an annual hearing about youth unemployment, where the report was presented. He encouraged everyone to walk down the street and witness how joblessness devastates communities…”
Tag: Youth employment
Disconnected Youth
The young and the disconnected: America’s youth unemployment problem, By Robert Samuels, October 27, 2014, Washington Post: “The mentor and mentee sat in a room in the Latin American Youth Center, dreaming of a future neither knew how to fully attain. ‘How many jobs do you think you’ve applied for?’ Jaime Roberts asked her mentee. Manuel Hernandez laughed nervously. The question seemed so important, but the goal seemed so futile. ‘I stopped counting,’ Hernandez said. ‘Maybe 12? Maybe more?’ Hernandez is 24. He has never held a steady job, never went college and has a felony conviction. But he also has a budding artist as a son, who keeps asking for an art set that Dad can’t afford to buy. The mistakes in his past have resulted in him being stuck in a national economic conundrum: how to help young people, between 16 and 24, who are neither enrolled in school nor employed. Policymakers call them ‘disconnected youth.’ Hernandez calls them ‘friends…'”
Youth Unemployment
The youth unemployment crisis hits African-Americans hardest, By NPR Staff, July 21, 2014, NPR: “Young people are being chased out of the labor market. Though the national unemployment rate has fallen steadily in recent months, youth unemployment remains stubbornly high, and the jobless rate is even higher among young minorities. For young people between the ages of 16 and 24, unemployment is more than twice the national rate, at 14.2 percent. For African-Americans, that rate jumps to 21.4 percent. . .”