Social Justice

Kalli Christensen, Ali (Leyuan) Li, Zayetzy Luna Garcia

Employment

Long-term Unemployment is a Social and Economic Problem in America.

Unemployment is defined by the Bureau of Labor Statistics as people who do not have a job, have actively looked for work in the past four weeks, and are currently available for work. Unemployment is universally recognized as undesirable and it is a social problem.

Individual

The unemployment has direct connection with individual. There is an immediate impact on the person’s standard of living when a person is unemployed, and these people will consume far less than usual. However, the economic consequences can go beyond just less consumption.

Prolonged unemployment can lead to an erosion of skills, and greater skepticism and pessimism about the value of education and training and lead to workers being less willing to invest in the long years of training some jobs require.

Society

Unemployment effect society by how people interact with each other. Studies have shown that times of elevated unemployment often correlate both with less volunteerism and higher crime.

Country

Unemployment leads to higher payments from state and federal governments for unemployment benefits, food assistance, and Medicaid. The governments cannot collect the same levels of income tax, which forcing them to borrow money or cut back on other spending. Unemployment may reduce the GDP and moves the country away from the efficient allocation of its resources.

Detroit is an 80% African-American city. The unemployment numbers are higher than the rest of the state and the nation. The gap between national rate and city rate is not large because this date doesn't included two groups of people: people who’ve given up looking for work. And people who have a part-time job, but want to be working full-time. The unemployment rate for black Americans has fallen from a high of 21.2 percent in January 1983 to 6 percent in September, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. That’s nearly double overall national unemployment rate of 3.7 percent.

According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), the median weekly wage for workers in the United States in the fourth quarter of 2018 was $900. From the chart above, half of Detroit counties meet the national median wage.

While black employment has improved, it has not yet translated into broader economic gains.

Germantown is a neighborhood that is 80 percent black and the median income is $28,046, less than half the national average. The poverty rate is 34 percent, nearly three times the national rate of 12.7 percent.

Opportunity

Community Partner

We worked with Life Remodeled, a nonprofit organizations dedicated to reducing the impact of poverty in lives within the Detroit Community.

Life Remodeled

In Metropolitan Detroit, we have witnessed well-intention suburban individuals and groups attempt to alleviate Detroit’s poverty crisis. Life remodeled exists where all sides are inspired to do the hard work of relationship building.

Life Remodeled invests in the neighborhood surrounding Central High School and the Durfee Innovation Society. The Durfee Innovation Society (DIS) exists to create substantial and impactful opportunities for Detroit children, families and single adults.

Instead of creating new programs, they created a dynamic space for the best and brightest nonprofit organizations and for-profit companies to move in, share resources and achieve greater collective impact. They provide innovative approaches to education, employment, support for entrepreneurs and various social services.

http://liferemodeled.com/

Housing

What is affordable housing?

In the United States affordable housing is considered as not exceeding 30% of the median household income of the area.

As we can see in the map above, median rent per month in Detroit is $778. This is below the national median but still makes Detroit the most expensive county in Michigan.

The map on the left concurs with the blue section of the map above. In the blue section, the median income is $28,613. Using the two stats, the housing in Detroit accounts for 32.6% of income.

However, the prices on the map (left) are for single bedroom housing. In addition, the map on the right shows family income for the average family size of 3 people. This has lead to many families living together to afford housing.

Racial Diversity

Detroit is known as "Motor City" for its substantial automotive companies that populated the city and surrounding areas. With that automotive introduction to Detroit, rapid growth followed due to many looking for jobs. As soon as the automotive industries began to move overseas or areas that produced automobiles cheaper, Detroit was one motor hub that was completely affected by the loss. The city of Detroit began to lose much of their population because jobs, wealth, and status were sought after in the suburbs, otherwise known as "the white flight". The racial segregation grew increasingly more distinct especially with the previous redlining that occurred, discrimination within home mortgage industry, that occurred in the 1930s.

From our experience, we clearly saw the effects from past racial discrimination and stereotyping, but we also saw the present racial dividing as well. Modern day redlining still does occur within Detroit (see image below) and the poor education and disciplinary actions within schools are repressing black individuals under the age of 18, not even mentioning individuals above 18. Those issues are directed onto the kids that will be the next generation to come, setting them up for another generation of discrimination and wage gap between white individuals.

Recognizing the racial division within Detroit, one of our goals was to educate the kids on some of the inequities that exist within the community and particularly around race. What is most encouraging is knowing that an organization like New Detroit exists within Detroit to do just that: work to educate others about the racial inequities and make efforts to relieve it.

New Detroit's Mission: "New Detroit is a coalition of leaders working to achieve racial understanding and racial equity in Metropolitan Detroit."

"We believe that racial equity:

Is a non-negotiable condition of the way we do things in our greater Detroit community, is essential for the quality of life and opportunity of every individual, is critical to our economic success, and is a hallmark of who we are as a city.
Brings with it benefits to everyone, regardless of race, that include income, quality education, and health and safety.
Is a shared responsibility for action among people of every race – there are no victims and no oppressors in the shared work toward the goal, just people trying to solve a fundamental shared problem together, and sharing in its benefits."

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