Causes Of The Black-White Wage Gap

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Parth Jhaveri

Examining the Core Cause of the Black-White Wage Gap?

Today, on average, black workers earn less than white workers. This has been the case since the days of slavery. Although times have changed, there seems to be a consistent wage gap between black and white laborers. This wage gap could be caused by many factors such as geographical location, family and surroundings, education level, etc. This paper focuses on the true, underlying cause of the wage gap- lack of skill.

Throughout American history, racial and ethnic issues have always created a dividing line in personal lives and in society. Although slavery has been abolished, issues that have stemmed from the period are still prevalent in various aspects of our lives. For as long as we've known, minorities, specifically African Americans, have always faced inequality in wage distribution. In 1964, the Civil Rights Act was passed and it became illegal for employers to discriminate based on race. This didn't help much as the wage gap between African Americans and whites only narrowed a little. Very little has changed since then. “Today, African American men working full time and year round have 72 percent of the average earnings of comparable white men. For African American and white women, the ratio is 85 percent. And during good times and bad, the black unemployment rate is typically stuck at about double the white rate” (Rodgers). Black-white wage differences have been the subject of many academic debates and research. There are two theories as to why racial wage gaps are persistently present. First, researchers claim that premarket factors such as quality of schooling, part-time work, marital status, geographical location, and actual labor ma...

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...ults probably understated the true effects of labor market discrimination. Others argue that the AFQT is racially biased, but through a study run by the Department of Defense, it was found that the AFQT does not under predict black job performance.
In conclusion, based on findings from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth and previous studies, it is safe to say that the black white wage gap exists due to lack of skills in young black workers and not as much because of labor market discrimination. There are many premarket factors such as quality of schooling, part-time work, marital status, geographical location, and actual labor market experience that could affect the ability to gain cognitive skill. Regardless, it is the obstacles that African Americans faced as children that hinder them from obtaining the skills needed to shrink the wage gap even further.

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