What Went Wrong? The Erosion of Relative Earnings and Employment Among Young Black Men in the 1980s
Author(s)
Bound, John; Freeman, Richard B.
Abstract
From the mid-1960s to the mid-1970s black Americans made large gains in the labor market relative to whites but the era of relative black economic advance ended in the mid-1970s. Thereafter, racial earnings and employment gaps widened rapidly for male workers. This article explores what went wrong beginning in the late 1970s, based on the annual Current Population Survey and other data on individual workers. The analysis focuses on young men (defined as those under 28, and less than 10 years out of school) because they are more affected by current labor market conditions; older workers are protected to some extent by seniority and the accumulation of human capital. The changes since the 1970s can be attributed to a variety of factors, including the economic decline of inner cities, the loss of manufacturing jobs, the fall in the real value of the minimum wage, and the decline in union membership for those with less education. The declining relative position of black college graduates may reflect the weakening of affirmative action, occupational downgrading, the decline in government employment, and the huge increase in the ratio of black to white college graduates.
