Study: Black men working less

WASHINGTON, July 23 (UPI) -- Black men in the United States face higher joblessness rates and increased idleness since the Civil Rights era, a Chicago study indicates.

The report by Northeastern University's Center for Labor Market Studies indicates among the nation's black teens, fewer than 20 percent, age 16 to 19, were employed during 2003, an employment rate just half that of white teens.

With 20-to-24-year-old black men, employment rates averaged 57 percent during the past three years, compared with an average of 80 percent employment in the late 1960s. The percentage of young black men employed in 2003 lagged well behind the white male employment rate by nearly 20 percentage points.

In 2002, 25 percent of African-American men ages 20 to 64 were unemployed all year, a rate twice as high as that of white and Hispanic males.

Economist Andrew Sum and his colleagues made several suggestions to combat this trend, including job creation programs, expansion of school-to-career transition programs, social and economic investments to develop skills while in schools, and a serious effort to improve black men's employability and earnings.