"Black turnout surpassed white voters for first time" by Hope Yen | Associated Press, April 29, 2013
WASHINGTON — America’s black voters turned out at a higher rate than other minority groups in 2012 and by most measures surpassed white turnout for the first time, reflecting a deeply polarized election in which blacks strongly supported Barack Obama while many whites just stayed home.
Had people voted last November at the same rates they did in 2004, when black turnout was below its current historic levels, Republican Mitt Romney would have won narrowly, according to an analysis done for the Associated Press.
Census data and exit polling show that whites and blacks will remain the two largest racial groups of eligible voters for the next decade. Last year’s heavy black turnout came despite concerns about the effect of new voter-identification laws on minority voting, outweighed by the desire to reelect the first black president.
William H. Frey, a demographer at the Brookings Institution, analyzed the 2012 elections using census data on eligible voters and turnout, along with November’s exit polling....
estimated.... used population projections to estimate....
All good fun, but is it news I need to know?
Overall, the findings represent a tipping point for blacks, who for much of America’s history were disenfranchised and then effectively barred from voting until the passage of the Voting Rights Act in 1965.
But the numbers also offer a cautionary note to both Democrats and Republicans after Obama won in November with a historically low percentage of white supporters. With Hispanics now the biggest driver of US population growth, they still trail whites and blacks in turnout and electoral share, because many of the nation’s Hispanics are children or are not citizens....
The 2012 data suggest Romney was a particularly weak GOP candidate, unable to motivate white voters let alone attract significant black or Latino support. Obama’s personal appeal and the slowly improving US economy helped overcome doubts and spur record levels of minority voters.
Then it was stolen, wasn't it?
‘‘It remains to be seen how successful Democrats are if you don’t have Barack Obama at the top of the ticket,’’ said Whit Ayres, a GOP consultant advising Senator Marco Rubio, a Florida Republican and possible 2016 presidential contender.
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"Wealth gap between whites, minorities widening" by Annie Lowrey | New York Times, April 29, 2013
WASHINGTON — Millions of Americans suffered a loss of wealth during the recession and the sluggish recovery that followed. But the last half-decade has proved far worse for black and Hispanic families than for white families, starkly widening the already large gulf in wealth between white Americans and most minorities, according to a study from the Urban Institute.
‘‘It was already dismal,’’ Darrick Hamilton, a professor at the New School in New York, said of the wealth gap between black and white households. ‘‘It got even worse.’’
Given the dynamics of the housing recovery and the rebound in the stock market, the wealth gap might still be growing, experts said, further dimming the prospects for economic advancement for current and future generations of Americans from minority groups.
The study found that the racial wealth gap yawned during the recession, even as the income gap remained stable....
That's a LIE!
‘‘The racial wealth gap is deeply rooted in our society, and we need to care about it.’’
It used to be the 99% against the 1, but I gue$$ my one-percenter paper has helped me understand it better.
Many experts consider the wealth gap more pernicious than the income gap, as it perpetuates from generation to generation and has a powerful effect on economic security and mobility. Young black people are much less likely than young white people to receive a large sum from their parents or other relatives to pay for college, start a business, or make a down payment on a home. That, in turn, makes their wealth-building prospects shakier as they move into adulthood.
Two major factors helped to widen this wealth gap in recent years. The housing downturn hit black and Hispanic households harder than it hit white households....
Discriminatory lending practices were also a factor....
Black families also suffered bigger hits to their retirement savings, the Urban Institute found....
The institute suggests reforming policies that encourage savings but disproportionately benefit the already wealthy and families with high incomes, like the home mortgage interest deduction. Automatic savings vehicles also might help lower-income and lower-wealth families start saving, it said.
Hamilton has proposed ‘‘baby bonds,’’ granting savings accounts to infants, seeded with funds that allocate greater sums to families with less wealth. (Such accounts would be race-blind, Hamilton stressed.) Account holders could tap that money as young adults to pay for college or start a business.
‘‘That’s really going to break the link of intergenerational poverty, and the intergenerational wealth gap,’’ Hamilton argued.
But in the absence of such far-reaching measures, scholars and advocates remain generally pessimistic that the wealth gap will narrow even as minority groups increase their share of the workforce.
‘‘The growth in the wealth divide is going to be very hard to close,’’ said Dedrick Muhammad, senior director of the economic department at the NAACP.
“I don’t have a positive feeling about racial wealth inequality resolving itself with the recovery.’’
Or the other one, either.
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Related:
"US wealth gap grew during recovery; Stock holdings outpace homes" by Pauline Jelinek | Associated Press, April 24, 2013
WASHINGTON — The richest Americans got richer during the first two years of the economic recovery while average net worth declined for the other 93 percent of US households, a report released Tuesday said.
(Blog editor brings his legs together, sits up straight in his seat, and calmly types that this is proof only the elite that caused the Grand Depression benefited, there never was the recovery the ma$$ media shit bags constantly procliam, it's all been lies, lies, lies, lies, lies, lies, lies about the economy, lies about the environment, lies about wars, lies about mass shootings, lies about every single thing you see from them. Everything. Everything. Everything)
The upper 7 percent of households owned 63 percent of the nation’s household wealth in 2011, up from 56 percent in 2009, said the report from the Pew Research Center, which analyzed Census Bureau data released last month.
The main reason for the widening wealth gap is that affluent households typically own stocks and other financial holdings that increased in value, while the less wealthy tend to have more of their assets in their home, which has not rebounded from the plunge.
???
But I've been told again and again and again home prices have been rising, have been rising, are in good shape.
And my pension is still flat when the stock market is zooming. What's up with that (blog editor almost in tears and can't see type no mrkw)?
Tuesday’s report is the latest to point up financial inequality that has been growing among Americans for decades, a development that helped fuel the Occupy Wall Street protests....
Which has been all but forgotten, and for good reason.
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But it's all a black/white thing.
"They have been through tough times. Most are construction workers and laborers, and their jobs dried up during the recession. They got through it with one another’s help. Now they have been hit harder, and more than ever, they know, they need one another."
Wow. Both white.
"They have been through tough times. Most are construction workers and laborers, and their jobs dried up during the recession. They got through it with one another’s help. Now they have been hit harder, and more than ever, they know, they need one another."
Wow. Both white.
