The Value of Labor by Marc Morial
(To Be Equal #34) – Despite the dizzying array of clearance sales and bargains to be found in our nation’s malls and department stores, Labor Day is no creation of our retail industry. It is our nation’s annual tribute to the working class, American worker whose physical, and largely manual labor, built this country’s infrastructure and built a labor movement that spurred social and economic achievements for all American workers-regardless of job sector.
As we celebrate labor and America’s slow but steady climb to new-found economic prosperity during its most sustained period of job creation this century, we discover a dark cloud inside the silver lining of our recovery: the prosperity of the American economy is not being shared equally. Too many people are working harder, but are falling further behind. Too many people remain at the distant margins of the job market-particularly in our communities of color, where unemployment remains at crisis level, even as our economy continues to rebound.
The unemployment rate in our country currently sits at 5.3%, it’s lowest rate since May 2008. But take a deeper dive into those numbers and the tale of two recoveries is clear and unmistakable. While the unemployment rate for whites is at 4.6%, the Hispanic unemployment rate is at 6.8% and the Black unemployment rate is 9.1%-double that of white job seekers. The unemployment rates for Blacks and Hispanics are nothing if not discouraging and telling. These communities, especially hard hit during the last recession, are not benefiting from our economy’s rebound.
The ability to secure work that provides a fair, living wage-regardless of gender-is an asset to the worker, the worker’s family, neighborhood, community, and ultimately, our nation. We are an immensely stronger America when access to work is not excluded to some, but rather, extended to all.
That is why the National Urban League has proposed a 12-point Blueprint for Quality Job Creation. Our plan offers a dozen dynamic and imaginative measures to benefit those most profoundly affected by recession but left out of the ensuing recovery, while also remedying many of the underlying causes behind the recession’s inordinate and amplified impact on the communities we serve:
We continue to urge Congress and the White House to adopt these measures without delay. The standard of living many of us take for granted today was won for us through the determination and organized protests of the American worker. The solidarity of the workers of the past must be reborn in our political discourse today as we collectively strive to open blocked pathways to work, success and the American dream of economic mobility. We must all work together-individuals, politicians and corporations-to ensure the possiblity of work for fair wages for all who seek it.
