Posted on 03/21/2015 9:39:20 AM PDT by Altura Ct.
Racism and job discrimination cost the state of Georgia nearly $4 billion a year in lost tax revenue—an amount that’s equivalent to 20 percent of the state’s budget last year. Or to put another way, it’s twice as much as the state spent to run the entire 30-school University of Georgia system, and almost four times as much as the state spent last year on prisons.
That’s the conclusion drawn from a fascinating report released this week by the Center for American Progress that quantifies approximately how much America’s fastest growing states are losing in tax revenue because of systemic racism against African-Americans and Hispanics.
Most studies on the impact of racism investigate its effects on the victims. But the Center for American Progress (CAP) decided to take it a step further and see how much it costs the country and individual states—in other words, how much it hurts white people—because there is such a big gap in the average income of whites and the income of Blacks and Hispanics.
Staying with the state of Georgia for a minute, the average income for whites in 2013 was $43,764. For Black residents the average was $28,272, while the average for Hispanics was $26,838. By CAP’s estimate, eliminating racial disparities in income in the state of Georgia would gain the state an additional $3.8 billion in tax revenue and would boost the state’s gross domestic product from $455 billion to $522 billion.
Clearly, eliminating racism in the arena of education and employment discrimination in the state would be of enormous benefit to every resident in the state.
This finding is especially relevant in states like Georgia because the Black and Hispanic populations are increasing while the white population drops, meaning the states’ coffers will be dramatically affected if the incomes of Black and Hispanic workers aren’t increased. In 2000, whites were 63 percent of Georgia’s population, Blacks were 29 percent and Hispanics were just 5 percent. But in 2013, the white percentage of the population had fallen to 54 percent while the Black percentage had risen to 31 percent and Hispanics had jumped to 9 percent. By 2020, Blacks and Hispanics combined are estimated to be 41 percent of Georgia’s population while whites will be 52 percent.
Some of the other states in the CAP study were Florida (which would receive a $5.6 billion tax boost if salaries were equal), California ($20.8 billion tax boost), Illinois ($4.8 billion), New Jersey ($4.2 billion), North Carolina ($2.6 billion), Texas ($14.1 billion) and New York ($8 billion).
For those who posit that the comparison is not consistent because many factors go into the average income difference between white workers and Black and Hispanic workers, it should be noted that most of those factors are due to racism—outright racism in the discriminatory hiring practices of employers and systemic racism in areas such as the disparate quality of education offered to whites and to Black and Hispanic communities.
Ending racial inequality “is not just going to benefit Black and brown people, but all Americans and the whole economy, and make us more competitive,” Vanessa Cardenas, vice president of Progress 2050, the arm of CAP that promotes policies it says benefit a diverse America, told Fusion.
“The important thing about this is it doesn’t matter [which party] one comes from in terms of elected leaders at the local level,” Cardenas added. “They all should be thinking about how their states are changing and what policies will create a ladder of opportunity for the next generation of Americans.”
Since the Census projects that people of color will be a majority of the U.S. population by 2043, a failure to address this issue will have enormous consequences for the U.S. in many areas, such as tax revenues, GDP and global competitiveness. If there is significantly less money in the nation’s coffers, ultimately it would harm such revered institutions as the vaunted U.S. military.
And the racism in the job market doesn’t appear to be on the verge of subsiding any time soon. A researcher from the University of Michigan recently confirmed that even when Black students excel in the classroom, obtain degrees from the most prestigious universities and perform at the level of their white counterparts, they are still far less likely to get callbacks for job positions if the employer suspects that they are Black.
S. Michael Gaddis, who conducted the study, wrote that, “The opportunities that arise upon graduation from an elite university are not equal between whites and blacks.”
Gaddis noted that Black graduates from elite universities still had an advantage over students from less prestigious universities when they entered the job market, but they still lagged significantly behind their white peers.
In addition, even when Black graduates finally received a request for a follow up interview, they were offered significantly lower salaries than their white counterparts.
“Black candidates receive responses for jobs that have a listed salary $3,071 lower than white candidates,” the study found.
The calculations by CAP are an important addition to the discussion of racism in the U.S., assessing that it will hit the nation where it hurts most—the pocketbook.
They are perpetuating a grotesque and destructive lie. It’s just evil.
I don’t want to hear the word ‘racism’ come out of a single black person’s mouth until they deal with their own anti-white racism.
Slowly, ever slowly blacks are revealing their true desire of conquest with total mastery not “sharing,” “the big tent,” “room at the table,” and other twaddle.
“Black candidates receive responses for jobs that have a listed salary $3,071 lower than white candidates,” the study found.
Well gee gosh Homer wonder if education had anything to do with it?.
Very peculiar math.
Apparently assumes that “equalization of incomes” would be achieved by blacks and hispanics being brought up to the average white levels.
Whereas of course the equalization could also be achieved by bringing the white average down. Which is of course much easier to accomplish.
The article did not indicate any explanation of exactly how racism costs the states lost revenue, nor any evidence that racism in hiring exists. I wonder if the study did.
Magical wealth for all!
With this logic, it makes sense to restrict immigration to only those who have the skills to earn 6 figures.
By penning such a truly moronic article he only reinforces the racial stereotype.
How much does the state of Georgia get in wealth transfers? Much of that untaxed and unreported.
I agree that racism is costly to states. Therefore, white people should stop subsidizing black sloth, corruption, and crime by paying for useless welfare giveaways, food stamps, BET, Obamaphones, Obamacare, midnight basketball, Head Start, and all the other worthless redistributionist programs invented by the communist Left.
Clearly half the population not graduating high school has nothing to do with it
Having taught at an inner-city high school for many years, I can tell you EXACTLY what holds blacks back from being able to compete with whites in the job market. My guess is that many of you here at FR already know, so I won’t waste my breath...
Total nonsense. The pay for various jobs performed in Georgia and any other state is not set based on the race of the worker, but upon the skill required by the job and the supply and demand of able and willing workers.
If every worker had an advanced college degree, then we'd have thousands of folks with advanced degrees performing low wage jobs. But the basic assumptions of this article are pure nonsense.
WATCHING COLLEGE BASKETBALL IS PARTICIPATING IN ‘ORGANIZED THEFT OF BLACK WEALTH’ SAYS WHITE GUY ON MSNBC
Climate Racism.....
ridiculous... it has nothing to do with race... it has to do with job skills...
“Affirmative Action” reduces the value of so-called “equal qualifications” and “prestigious universities”, when minorities are admitted and advanced based on race instead of objective merit.
We got an affirmative action president, afraid to reveal his grades and “scholarly writings” and he turned out to be the worst ever.
“In addition, even when Black graduates finally received a request for a follow up interview, they were offered significantly lower salaries than their white counterparts.”
If they have the same skills, that is criminal; if everything they do has to be spell-checked re-written anyway, what is the problem? I had a file clerk who filed anything for “Mr. Xyz” under “M”; money down the drain. She then complained when an accounting position (that required years of experience) went to another employee. Both were black females, yet the file clerk still sees racism there somewhere...
Income inequality-the condition where high school dropouts and single mothers don’t feel they are getting a big enough piece of the pie even though they have done nothing to earn it.
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