Thursday, February 11, 2010

Unemployment hits some groups harder (And SOME groups, namely Asians less..)

Seattle Times headline Feb 7, 2010 Unemployment hits some groups harder (http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/businesstechnology/2010995609_sundaybuzz07.html)

"The overall unemployment rate in December was 9.5 percent in Washington State, 10 percent nationally..... According to the Employment Policies Institute, the jobless rate for adult men in Washington [state] in December was 11.6 percent, versus 8.4 percent for women. Unemployment among African Americans, at 21.4 percent, was more than twice the level for whites (10 percent), while only 5.3 percent of the state's Asian Americans were unemployed" 

Every paper always reports which group(s) group were unemployed at twice the rate of whites, the usual African Americans. But 5.3 percent Asians is HALF, or a factor of two BETTER than whites. Kudos for the Seattle Times for even including the number as Asians are routinely left out of national figures, and even in California where Asians outnumber African Americans. Now Asians don't nearly come out on top of every statistic, and I've always wondered if Asians were so darned smart, why is it the whites are detested for dominating everything. But this is part of a pattern where one group "of color" bucks the color = failure sociological model by consistently coming out ahead of whites when African Americans are behind (and vice versa when African Americans come out ahead).

tags: asian american african black model minority economics racism unemployment