Anderson@Large

Web 2.0 and Black Joblessness

I LOL when I read that New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg's “New Year's resolution is to learn to code.”

The same day Bloomberg tweeted his plan, the Bureau of Labor Statistics released the latest jobs report. And it was no laughing matter. While the overall unemployment rate fell to its lowest level in nearly three years, black joblessness rose from 15.5 percent to 15.8 percent.

Private employers added 1.9 million jobs in 2011. Black workers are disproportionately employed in the public sector which lost 244,000 jobs last year. The writing is on the wall: A secure “good government job” is going the way of six-day mail delivery.

Innovation will accelerate public sector downsizing. The San Francisco Chronicle reported:

The nonprofit Code for America plans to open a first-of-its-kind “civic accelerator” in San Francisco, a program designed to house, mentor and fund startups focused on using technology to improve government efficiency.

[…]

The details are still being worked out, but Code for America will work with the city to identify departments in particular need of new online tools. Code for America will sponsor so-called hackathons this spring and summer to find and fund entrepreneurs building the most promising solutions.

As cities and states rethink how they deliver public services, workers will feel the impact. So if Bloomberg has resolved to learn code in 2012, why not you?

Numbers Behind the 'Good News'

The Bureau of Labor Statistics reports the national unemployment rate fell to 8.5 percent last month, a three-year low. Employers added 200,000 jobs in December, including transportation and warehousing, health care and social assistance, retail trade, manufacturing, leisure and hospitality, and construction.

Black women and black teens didn't get the memo that employers were hiring.

The black unemployment rate rose from 15.5 percent to 15.8 percent. Black male joblessness fell from 16.4 percent to 15.7 percent.

Black female unemployment is 13.9 percent, up from 13.0 percent. Black teen joblessness also rose from 39.6 percent to 42.1 percent.

Plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose. The more things change, the more they stay the same. Black folks are still the last hired.

(Pre-)Occupied in Philly

Sarah Palin famously said she could see Russia from her window. I can’t see Occupy Philadelphia from my apartment, but I sometimes hear the protesters.

I have not blogged much the last few days because I’ve been preoccupied with a project. I’ll get back to my regular schedule next week.

With folks in an uproar from the Big Apple to the Big Easy, a Facebook friend left this comment on my wall:

Buckle up! The pot is starting to stir. 2012 is starting to look like it’s going to be a real doozy of a year with a spectacular conclusion, considering the economy and the election, and people in the streets, and the Mayan Calendar thing and all.

While it “ain’t exactly clear” what’s going down, it’s going down all around us.

Poll Says Obama is One and Done

A Washington Post/ABC News poll found most Americans expect President Obama to lose in 2012.

Things went from bad to worse when Obama handed Republicans a gaffe gift that will keep on giving in attack ads. In an interview with ABC News’ George Stephanopoulos, Obama said the American people are “not better off”:

Well, I don’t think they’re better off than they were four years ago. They’re not better off than they were before Lehman’s collapse, before the financial crisis, before this extraordinary recession that we’re going through. I think that what we’ve seen is that we’ve been able to make steady progress to stabilize the economy, but the unemployment rate is still way too high. And that’s why it’s so critical for us to make sure that we are taking every action we can take to put people back to work.

Sure, some of Obama’s ideas have had bipartisan support in the past. But the only thing voters will hear a year from now is Obama saying Americans are “not better off.”

Obama to African Americans: Stop Cryin’ the Blues

President Obama spoke before the Congressional Black Caucus Foundation’s Annual Phoenix Awards Dinner on Saturday.

In his remarks, Obama acknowledged the disparate impact of the recession on African Americans:

Times have been hard. It’s been three years since we faced down a crisis that began on Wall Street and then spread to Main Street, and hammered working families, and hammered an already hard-hit black community. The unemployment rate for black folks went up to nearly 17 percent -- the highest it’s been in almost three decades; 40 percent, almost, of African American children living in poverty; fewer than half convinced that they can achieve Dr. King’s dream.

He also acknowledged the growing chorus of criticism:

I know at times that gets folks discouraged. I know. I listen to some of y’all.

But Obama has had enough of the bad mouthing:

Take off your bedroom slippers, put on your marching shoes. Shake it off. Stop complainin’, stop grumblin’, stop cryin’. We are going to press on. We have work to do.

Washington Post columnist Courtland Milloy Jr. wrote:

Funny, isn’t it, how Obama always gets the nerve to say shut up when he’s addressing a friendly audience?

The black unemployment rate stands at 16.7 percent, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, up from 11.5 percent when Obama took office. By some accounts, black people have lost more wealth since the recession began than at any time since slavery. And Obama gets to lecture us?

Hey, “don’t be cryin’ the blues… Don’t nobody bring [Obama] no bad news.”

Solyndra in the Hot Seat

This morning, executives from the bankrupt Solyndra will be hauled before the House Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations to tell what they did with taxpayers’ $535 million.

While Chief Executive Officer Brian Harrison and Chief Financial Officer Bill Stover are expected to take the Fifth Amendment, some former Solyndra employees are talking.

The Washington Post reports:

Former employees of Solyndra, the shuttered solar company that exhausted half a billion dollars of taxpayer money, said they saw questionable spending by management almost as soon as a federal agency approved a $535 million government-backed loan for the start-up.

[…]

As the $344 million factory went up just down the road from the company’s leased plant in Fremont, Calif., workers watched as pallets of unsold solar panels stacked up in storage. Many wondered: Was the factory needed?

“After we got the loan guarantee, they were just spending money left and right,” said former Solyndra engineer Lindsey Eastburn. “Because we were doing well, nobody cared. Because of that infusion of money, it made people sloppy.”

The issue of crony capitalism was raised by Robert Johnson during the Congressional Black Caucus Foundation’s town hall on jobs and economic opportunity.

Johnson asked how a risky start-up like Solyndra received $535 million when black-led start-ups can’t get access to capital. He observed:

Somebody said there’s a compelling interest in seeing green. But nobody said there’s a compelling interest in seeing black wealth.

It is said there are no coincidences in politics. I hope congressional investigators find out who in the Obama administration thought the Solyndra fraudsters had a compelling claim to taxpayers’ money.

The hearing is open to the public. Opening statements, witness testimonies, and a live webcast will be available here.

National Town Hall: Economic Opportunity and Jobs

Civil rights leader Whitney M. Young Jr. once said, “The hardest work in the world is being out of work.”

That is the sad reality for 25 million Americans, including nearly three million African Americans.

At today’s town hall, the Congressional Black Caucus Foundation will focus on the jobless crisis in the African American community and strategies for job creation that will help those who have been hardest hit by the recession.

CBCF Chairman Rep. Donald Payne said in a statement:

We are facing an unprecedented crisis in our community, with the possibility of generations of African-Americans permanently detached from economic opportunity. The CBCF understands the importance of bringing our brightest minds to the table to find solutions that will provide jobs and bring financial security to families.

Those bright minds include:

• Dr. Julianne Malveaux, president, Bennett College for Women
• Marc Morial, president and CEO, National Urban League
• William Lucy, president, Coalition of Black Trade Unionists

The National Town Hall is free and open to the public. It will take place from 9:00 am to 11:30 am in Ballroom A in the Walter E. Washington Convention Center.

If like me, you can’t make it to DC, no problem. You can join the discussion via a live webcast. I wil tweet the event (hashtag #41stALC).