Community-Based Research Commons^™

Theoretical Explanations Of Persistent Black Youth Unemployment, Rhonda M. Williams

Trotter Review

This essay reviews and briefly summarizes three theoretical models used most often to explain two decades of persistently high unemployment among black youth and declining rates of male labor-force participation: neoclassical, Keynesian/neo-Keynesian, and radical perspectives. Based on a review of these models, it offers an alternative approach to explaining and analyzing black youth unemployment.

Myths And Realities Of Puerto Rican Poverty, Edwin Melendez

Trotter Review

The following remarks were made as the closing keynote address at the conference, "Mainland Puerto Ricans: Myths and Realities on Poverty," held at Yale University in New Haven, Connecticut, on October 22 and 23, 1993.

There are two "stories" frequently cited to explain the causes of the poverty among Puerto Ricans: the first suggests that Puerto Ricans are poor because they are going through a transition as they move toward full assimilation; the second proposes that Puerto Ricans are becoming part of an urban "underclass." Neither of these explanations stands the test of reality.

The Role Of Black Political Leadership In Economic Development, Curtis Stokes

Trotter Review

One of the most striking things about the United States is the degree to which racial inequality remains a pervasive fact of life. Indeed, since the end of the 1960s the black-white gap in life chances (for example, jobs and income) has worsened for large segments of the black community. To persistently face high unemployment and declining income is especially troublesome in a capitalist economy like that in the United States, where goods and services are rationed by a harsh market and where there is, at best, a very modest social safety net. The United Nation's Human Development Report 1993, …

"Economic Development" Is Not "Community" Development: Lessons For A Mayor, Eugene "Gus" Newport

Trotter Review

Economic development is one of the most important elements of an effective community development plan. Economic development can mean jobs for the community, as well as the development of new businesses and the enhancement of a city's tax base, which provides the funds to operate the government. I had campaigned on the need for responsible alternative economic development. But, one of the first things I learned is that community development often gets misinterpreted as economic development. That is an unfortunate mistake, since the term community development has a much broader meaning, both conceptually and practically. Community development means development of …