MarketWatch, March 5, 2018: African-American college graduation rates hit all-time high, but economic outcomes lag
After the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.’s 1968 assassination sparked riots across the U.S., President Lyndon B. Johnson commissioned a report to examine the roots of unrest in black communities. The primary cause? “White racism” leading to discrimination in unemployment, education and housing, the report found.
Some 50 years later, despite milestones including the election of America’s first black president, the economic landscape has barely changed for black Americans, a new report released this week by the Economic Policy Institute, a liberal, nonprofit Washington, D.C., think tank, found.
Public schools are underfunded, college tuition has soared
There has been substantial progress in high school degree attainment for African-Americans, the EPI study found: In 1968, only 54% of black Americans graduated high school while today 92% get a high school diploma.
Despite these gains in education, many high schools are not setting African-American students up for success in college, John Taylor, chief executive officer of the National Community Reinvestment Coalition, a non-profit that promotes economic fairness for underserved communities said.
A rise in charter schools have left many public schools underfunded, he said. College tuition has also soared in the decades since 1968, making higher education less attainable for everyone. Between 2008 and 2017 alone, the cost of attending a four-year public college increased in nearly every state, in some cases by thousands of dollars.
“This study calls into question the rollback of support for public education has had on African-Americans and underserved people,” he said. “It is ridiculous we do not have a commitment nationally to educate our young people — that doesn’t bode well for our country as a whole.”
