Entrenched financial disparities have made it hard for African-Americans to achieve equality.

Unequal in America

Entrenched financial disparities have made it hard for African-Americans to achieve equality.

By Susan Milligan Senior WriterMay 4, 2018, at 6:00 a.m.

ONE OF THE MOST JARRING and painful numbers in America's history on race relations is three-fifths. That, according to the U.S. Constitution written in 1789, was how African-American slaves were counted – as three-fifths of a person – determining population for the purpose of calculating states' representation in Congress.

More than two centuries after the Constitution was penned, a century and a half since the 14th Amendment undid the so-called "three fifths compromise," and 50 years since the height of the modern civil rights movement, African-Americans still fall short when it comes to equality, according to a sweeping report by the Urban League. To put a number on it, African-Americans are at 72.5 percent – less than three-fourths – when it comes to achieving equality with white Americans, according to the study, which addressed economics, health, education, civic engagement and social justice.

Although African-Americans are actually doing better than whites in a few subcategories – and while both races are improving in some areas even as the gap between the two groups remains wide – the report, The State of Black America, finds that the "Equality Index" for African-American has barely moved (and in some cases, has worsened) since 2005, the first year the Urban League issued the yearly report.

Movement has occurred in certain aspects of African-Americans' lives, such as education and health, experts in the field say. But entrenched financial disparities have made it hard for African-Americans to catch up economically, they say.

more
https://www.usnews.com/news/the-report/articles/2018-05-04/african-americans-lag-behind-whites-in-equality-index