European Stars and Stripes (Newspaper) - September 20, 1977, Darmstadt, Hesse                                Blac unemployment things have never been tougher by Jerry Flint new York times sitting around on a Bench waiting for the Wel fare Check watching to running Back and Forth Ito the liquor store. Got to be something better than that said Davida Williams 17 years old Black a High school dropout from Brooklyn. She is looking for a Job. She has not found one. Signing up filling out applications taking tests. I can Type. I can file. They never called  that s where it be sitting on the Bench said her boy Friend Edwyn Blake 18, staring hard at the people going  when the boredom gets bad the violence comes. The Young men go to the grass trying to Hurt each other. That s just working off frustration he said. Without even a recession to blame Black unemployment has taken on crisis proportions. August s rate for Black unemployment was 14.5 per cent Matching the Post world War ii Peak and 2.4 times the rate for Whites without jobs. For teen agers of working age the unemployment rate for Blacks is 40.4 per cent. President Carter has ordered his advisers to explain the reasons and come up with programs. But the Black unemployed can defy stereotyping. There Are the chronic unemployed and drifters steady workers who have been Laid off youngsters looking for the first real Job. There Are dropouts and College graduates the discouraged and optimists who Are certain they will find a Good Job if they keep trying. I think if i keep my nose to the Grindstone i can do it said Robert Fleming of Manhattan single and collecting $61 a week in unemployment compensation since his Book store Job folded in february. The 27-year-old graduate of Cleveland state University wanted social work now he thinks he might do better in business. But whatever happens there is no going Back to the old life in the Hough ghetto of Cleveland. Lots of friends Are in prison or on drugs or just out on the Block. There s resentment for the Guy who got away from Hough. But you know i was glad i got  the squeeze can be harder on family breadwinners. I be spent Over a year unemployed says James Thomas 32, of Boston who worked at a. &  eight years earning More than $5 an hour. I was driving a forklift and working in shipping an receiving. But then the Job closed out and the Ware House moved out of the  he is married and has 11 and 13-year-old daughters. The places i went where they were hiring offered to pay me $2.75 an hour and i had been making Over $5. I could t accept that kind of pay Cut with my family to support. At some of the places i went the places where the pay would be enough to support my family i d fill out an application. Then they d Tell me Well Call you which they never  Black unemployment rate has been double the White rate for years and the reasons have been re searched and recited Analysed and attacked with pro Grams and policies for a  roots Are in 200 years of racial discrimination that kept Black americans out of the mainstream. There have been dramatic changes in the last decade More than one million Young Blacks Are in College and open discrimination is banned by  i see Blacks unemployed from jobs they never would have gotten into when i came in said Chester Askew a supervisor at the new York state unemployment office in Manhattan. But new factors May be intensifying the Job problem despite the gains. Some of them Are 0 the great movement in jobs from City to suburb and from North to Sunbelt have separated millions of Blacks from the new centers of work. 0 some traditional opportunities Are being Cut off. The steel Industry for example is laying off the Automo bile Industry does not hire As it once did textiles Are hurting and demand for teachers has fallen. There can be troublesome social factors crime May wipe out Job providing neighbourhood businesses poor schooling May leave Young Blacks without Basic skills Reading and writing that make them attractive to employers and some critics of welfare and other payments to the poor say such payments discourage work. But the sudden spurt in Black unemployment this summer might also be tied to a slowdown in economic growth and the still swelling numbers of Mac youth the numbers of White work age teen agers actually is on the decline. Things have never been tougher in los Angeles says Gregory Binon 26, who says he has not worked since january 1976. Tuesday september 20, 1977 14.5 unemployment among Whites and Blacks percentage unemployed seasonally adjusted Black category includes 11 % other nonwhite races source Bureau of labor statistics 1967 1972 1977 August the stars and stripes new York times Page 13