I'm don't understand what you're saying. For both white and black, the employment rate approximately halves when you pass each of the two levels of employment. What discrepancy are you talking about?

The comment we're responding to is the one above that talks about young black males being better off changing their color to white, than getting their high school diploma.

This entire thread of discussion is on the topic of @kalendae's comment. The fact that the data indicates that it is literally better for a young man to be anything but black, than it is for a young man to be black, but educated. I was saying that what this data shows is contrary to what I believe about the country. That is, I believed that color doesn't matter, only education does. But color does matter, and to me, that is surprising. That's all I'm saying.

See @kalendae's comment.

Hmm, well I don't understand what you're getting at. You said:

"There is actually a demographic in the US for whom there is little incentive for education with respect to financial success."

This seems to me to be false, since college educated blacks have a higher employment rate than blacks who didn't finish highschool.

But maybe I'm missing the point. Anyway, it doesn't matter.

Good point. Motivation/evaluation to benifits only applies to things the person can change.

Sure, you might be better off if you were white or a woman, but it is cheaper to get an education (well, here in the UK it would be cheaper, I hear education can be expensive in the US...)

I suppose this is a good way to look at it. The REALITY is these guys can only do what they can do. The fact that what they can do may not help them pull equal to whites is beyond their control.

The issue is that I was raised to believe that all Americans, regardless of race, have the same access to opportunities. Then, when I grew up, graduated college and took a commission in the USMC, this idea was further drummed into me. But this data is saying that this is untrue. Setting up serious conflict in my mind. Which is what my original comment was about.

Put another way, if you change the things you can change, you can make yourself the equivalent of anyone was my view of the US. But this is not the case, even if these guys get an education their chances are still slimmer than other guys without an education.

The general feeling of acceptance here is somewhat shocking to me as well. This is not what I thought America was about, or the American people. Don't get me wrong, I know there are bigots, but I thought they were in the minority. Perhaps more naivete on my part.

In short, I find it totally unacceptable for a black high school grad to have less of a chance at opportunities than a white non graduate. Saying that if blacks get educated they can do better than non educated blacks, though not as well as non educated whites, is lunacy. It's like saying, this is the best that YOU can expect in this society, so be happy, there is no problem.

Why does that seem so acceptable to so many people here? Or maybe it is just the few who are talking the loudest I don't know. Or perhaps a lot of these people commenting are not even American. Which I would bet on, given the content of some of these comments.

It could also be that I have been living in the uber-privileged la-la land of an ex-military officer.

Or maybe a little bit of all of these things.

This country has tried to right many (atrocious) wrongs and things have improved largely, but no, all things are not yet equal. Imagine a large maze of (forgive the analogy) rats, some gray, some brown. The maze has bits of food and even material for shelter building. If all rats were released into the maze at the same time, all things being equal - physical sizes evenly distributed etc., each color of rat would survive equally as well. Now imagine releasing only the gray rats into the maze, holding the brown ones back, and imagine all these rats are intelligent - they can pass on information about the maze like where to find food to their offspring, so they become trained. Let's say you conducted this experiment over a long period of time, several years, and then one day you released the brown rats. You can see they would be at a disadvantage, even though they might have the same physical opportunity to the food and materials, the gray rats have "set up shop". Slaves in the U.S. were freed, but essentially just "released". (the 40 acres and a mule was never awarded) This is a crude analogy, but can show how such statistics can exist.

E-gad not the "40 acres and a mule" meme again.

Do some research. This was a promise made by a Civil War General to a specific bunch of people which was later rescinded by the president. There was no general law or promise that such would be provided to every freed slave. It happened for a brief period, in a relatively small location (Georgia) And it happened 150 years ago.

Aside from whether somebody was put into harm's way because his great-great-great grandfather missed out on the free mules, I just wanted to clarify that historical point. It's one of those historical revisions that seem to grow with the retelling.

Yes, I know it was rescinded (after Lincoln's assassination) before it could be extended to the rest of the subset of freed slaves. I was pointing out the "imbalance of the maze" was apparent even back then.

The issue is that I was raised to believe that all Americans, regardless of race, have the same access to opportunities.

I think that is a very important message to send out. You have to get people to believe that they can (and should!) succeed, even once the opportunity is there, otherwise they might not try. [1]

Saying that if blacks get educated they can do better than non educated blacks, though not as well as non educated whites, is lunacy.

Worth pointing out that the numbers, though best for the white group, are not as bad as that.

For men and women, ages 25-44:

            none     high school   college
    white   17.5%     8.1%         3.7%
    black   26.9%    14.0%         7.4% [2]

So, for each step up in education, the black person has a better chance than the white person on the level below. 26.9% is still a scary large number, though I'd like to think that the no-high school group is only a small proportion of the overall population.

(Also, yes, I've only been to the US a couple of times, but I'm not sure in which that affects my interpretation of these numbers.)

[1] Reminds me of the "How to get women into CS" discussion, I'm sure all the same arguments apply. See: http://www.cs.cmu.edu/~lblum/PAPERS/TransformingTheCulture.p...

[2] See what I did there, ignore half the data to make my point clearer? Because I felt bad about it, I'm going to include the whole set here:

              none     high school   college
    hispanic  13.1%     9.6%         4.9%
    other     13.6%     9.4%         4.8%
    white     17.5%     8.1%         3.7%
    black     26.9%    14.0%         7.4%

Now, before I did that, I hadn't noticed: if you're not going to finish high school, better make sure you're not white or black.

Eh, and there goes my unqualified optimism too. If you're hispanic/mixed/other and didn't finish high school, you've still got a better chance than a black person who did. Oops.

[3] And another point: I'd like to see the relative sizes of these "race" groups. I'm sure in the long term, that "mixed" group is going to become the largest.

Looks like you slowly talked yourself around to my conclusion. Black people, especially the young ones, seem to have a really unfortunate position. It seems qualified optimism is the only reasonable response to this data. At least if they get educated, they can do somewhat better for themselves. Though lesser educated people of other races will probably do better.

Also, for more good news, take a look at the numbers for blacks compared to others where the age is 15 - 24.

It would be interesting to see what the salaries and job types are for all of these groups: education might help significantly there (or might not; I have no idea).

(also, I think you mean veracity)

Ooops! You're right.

Sorry I'm just so bothered by that data.

Also, your other point is interesting as well. If a young black guy can get an education, let's say a high school diploma. He will have less of a chance of getting a job than a white man who does not have a high school diploma, we know that from this data. BUT, will the black guy with the high school diploma make more money than the white guy without a high school diploma IF he can find someone willing to give him a job? That's a great question. Prior to being presented with this data I would have been eager to get the answer. Now, I almost don't want to know, that answer could be even MORE depressing.

Google Book result, you'll be after page 31, table 2.7. Doesn't include figures for high school dropouts though.

"Racial and ethnic diversity in America: a reference handbook" - 2000

http://books.google.com/books?id=xc-YEVDhC0MC&pg=PA30...

The scary table is number 2.9:

    homicide by firearm, per year, per 100,000 people

    age       10-14    15-19    20-24
    white      0.5      3.9      5.6
    hispanic   1.1     14.0     18.1
    black      1.8     29.1     55.6(!!)