Collapse Of Black Families, Violence and Poverty

From Walter Williams at Townhall:

The poverty rate among blacks is 36 percent. Most black poverty is found in female-headed households. The poverty rate among black married couples has been in single digits since 1994 and is about 8 percent today. The black illegitimacy rate is 75 percent, and in some cities, it's 90 percent. But if that's a legacy of slavery, it must have skipped several generations, because in the 1940s, unwed births hovered around 14 percent.

 Along with the decline of the black family comes anti-social behavior, manifested by high crime rates. Each year, roughly 7,000 blacks are murdered (out of a total of about 14,000 victims). Ninety-four percent of the time, the murderer is another black person. According to the Bureau of Justice Statistics, between 1976 and 2011, there were 279,384 black murder victims. Using the 94 percent figure means that 262,621 were murdered by other blacks. Though blacks are 13 percent of the nation's population, they account for more than 50 percent of homicide victims. Nationally, the black homicide victimization rate is six times that of whites, and in some cities, it's 22 times that of whites.

There is little intelligent dialogue anywhere in the media to discuss what it might take to put black families back together.  In lieu of intelligent dialogue, black "leaders" only recite tired grievances that aren't true anymore.  The black family was intact in 1960.  The collapse of black families is a recent phenomena dating from the "Great Society" and War on Poverty days of the Johnson administration. After $21 Trillion in income support (support that was supposed to be temporary), the war on poverty hasn't help reduce poverty.  Take for example the housing projects that concentrated blacks within inner cities. Those blacks, having no ownership pride in that housing, destroy these properties and neighborhoods and the resulting decay caused "white flight" and business flight.  Business flight in turn means no employment opportunities. 

Also, when Liberals give more aid to single mothers because they are single, it results in more single mothers!  Or, if you give credits based on the number of children rather than the presence of a father, you get children without fathers.  The debate becomes: how to give aid to married couples to discourage single status?

For solutions, how about parallel vocational high schools to teach basic reading, arithmetic and writing but also job skills for those not on the college path?  This last concept could be expanded to include programs in arts; writing, performing arts, visual arts, and music.

Speaking of education, how about eliminating public unions--especially teacher unions that end up harming minorities the worst.  How do I know this?  Read about the court in California striking down union tenure policies for hurting minorities the most:

 A California judge ruled Tuesday that teacher tenure laws deprived students of their right to an education under the State Constitution and violated their civil rights. The decision hands teachers’ unions a major defeat in a landmark case, one that could radically alter how California teachers are hired and fired and prompt challenges to tenure laws in other states.

 “Substantial evidence presented makes it clear to this court that the challenged statutes disproportionately affect poor and/or minority students,” Judge Rolf M. Treu of Los Angeles Superior Court wrote in the ruling. “The evidence is compelling. Indeed, it shocks the conscience.”

Thirdly, end the criminalization of marijuana and release all the young (black) men in prison for possession and related non-violent crimes. That incarceration is making hard core criminals out of these young men.  Lastly, eliminate the Federal minimum wage guidance altogether.  The government needs to get out of the wage setting business including repealing the Bacon Davis Act which shuts out many workers in favor of union-only work. The higher the minimum wage, the less jobs exist for entry level young people.  And those entry level jobs are key in gaining skill and experience.  Marco Rubio has proposed a wage subsidy instead of a minimum wage and to replace the Earned Income Tax Credit idea.

A decent article in The Federalist gives some good advice to helping minorities and stopping the black cultural collapse.  But don't expect Democrats to help black people because they would oppose much of the ideas that would help.  This is because the answers that address collapsing families is 1) improve education by promoting LESS unionism in public schools (at least), 2) improve the economy to repatriate manufacturing by reforming and lowering corporate taxes, by less regulation and less big gov't.  Do these sound like Democratic policies?  3) Get the government out of the wage setting business especially the prescription of a too-high minimum wage for inner cities, 4) more local micro-financing (and training) to help people set-up small market places and food courts, etc, and 5) end the drug war against marijuana and free associated prisoners.