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I haven't started reading it yet, but I am sure it is going to be a very interesting 3 week article piece.

As a person who is a minority, I do sometimes wonder... and I guess it is partly due to my experiences when i was younger and the fact that my parents lived through the days where you drank out of a 'colored' water fountain... I wonder if I would be back on my feet right now working, at minimum 25,000 a year, if I were white. About 4 ears ago, maybe a few months before the Wolrd Trade Center 9/11 situation, I became unemployeed. No problem, I said to myself. I have a degree already, I'm back at school for a second degree in IT. I should be fine.

4 years and 30,000 dollars in debt later (school loans), I just now got a job and a unloader taking out boxes out of a truck... for 100 dollars a week. Inbetween I was a security guard and was fired for speaking out about a supervisor putting peoples lives in danger and a telemarketer for about a month.

My uncle said, "be careful, because if you have to start over, its going to take you longer because your Black." I thought to myself that might have been true in the 80's or even early 90's but not now. I'm smart, have a lot of talent, very personable... it wouldn't take me more than a year... mbe 2 before I got something.

I'm still waiting.


Many people seem a little shocked when thy speak to me after a while and wonder how I ended up here? A security guard? You could be a supervisor or manager... people I worked with say or the career manager at public assistance would try to get me a job that paid good money because I have a degree and from your demenor your a profesional.

Trust me when I say this. I gave up being a manager (even though I am well equipted to do so.. more than who I have bumped into over the years) and go for the low jobs now.

I sort of refuse to believe it is because of the color of my skin as to getting looked over, but I do wonder how I am having this long streak of jobless-ness or under-employement.

Maybe no one wants me because I haven't proved myself yet. I am trying to go back to school but because of what happened at my old job as a security guard I lost my student loans until I pay back 5000 (I had dropped classes because I was sick and then hospitalized).

So I am trapped. Can't sem to move forward, can't get the experience, can't get the knowledge.
It can't last forever I suppose. Where I am working at now has advancment. Maybe I can move up somewhere if I can take the abuse of moving 1000 packages an hour (from 10 lbs to 100).

Some days are really hard on my nose and ears, legs and arms.

Sometimes I wonder, if I was white and put on a suit with a dark overcoat would I have been hired somewhere else for more?


At any rate, this NY Times expose should be thought provocing.


Comments
on May 14, 2005
I just checked the link. It sure looks interesting. It was interesting the way the writers correlate education, occupation, income and wealth. It will also be interesting if they advance this to a correlation of race. It just may explain your lousy situation. As much as I hope not, it sure would prove a point, wouldn't it. A very disturbing point. I'm looking forward to the sequels. Thanks for the link.
on May 15, 2005
Class, and its relation to how we live and where we go in our lives is always an interesting subject. I mean, I look at the neighborhood I grew up in. We all went to the same school, those of us who went to church all went to the same one, all our folks made roughly the same amount. I mean, classwise, we all started out pretty much the same.

From that we have a couple of self made millionaires, at least one published author, a few retired military, a bunch of factory workers, some tool & die makers, 2 diesel mechanics, 3 professional musicians, a few CPAs, at least 3 registered sex offenders, a couple of convicted murderers, a couple ended up on the streets with drug addictions, a few of the girls were pregnant before they graduated high school, 2 before they got their drivers licenses, a suicide... and the beat goes on...

From our middle class neighborhood we all went our seperate ways and did our own thing, now most of us have kids that started out life far different from how we did, some as "the rich", most as "middle class" and some, "the poor". Only time will tell what our kids do with where we started them out.

I hope the NY Times does a good job on this expose, it has a lot of potential to be great, but with the NY Times lately... you never know. ;~D
on May 15, 2005
I think this part is interesting:
Link

I put in what I was doing back in 2001: In the field of Architecture, In Grad school, Income 26,000 a year, household income of 40,000 (had a fiance then... we were supposed to get married and have kids together... silly me)

Well, at least my education is in the 91 percentile!