MLK Day

I probably must have mentioned, in the past, that I was there at the August 1963 March on Washington, but I was wading in the reflecting pond, trying to cool off; the acoustics were terrible, and there was a lot of background noise; and I didn't hear a word of the "I have a dream" speech until I heard it on TV back home.

In the years since 1963, the proportion of the unemployed who are black has not changed — roughly twice the proportion of the unemployed who are white.  Now that more whites are unemployed, of course, it's worse, especially for black teens, who may as well be living in Greece or Spain.  Some suggest the problem is not "racism," per se, but the fact that there are so few jobs in areas with high concentrations of blacks.

Well, when neighborhoods have miniscule incomes, demand is miniscule as well, so there are no jobs.  It looks like the problem is the same as it was half a century ago: segregation.