Black Lives Matter & systemic racism

(6/22/20) My thoughts on why systemic racial inequality and discrimination are holding our country back from being a beacon of democracy and human rights.

This is for all my white friends who do not understand the anger and frustration, along with courage and conviction, of the current Black Lives Matter and police reform movement, or feel like Racism is a social construct of the past and no longer exists, or are just on the fence feeling like you are not a racist so this movement does not affect you personally.

I believe systemic and structural racism does still exist in this country that was born of genocide, colonization, slavery and racial hatred. As long as this continues, none of us will truly be free, and our country cannot claim to be the beacon of democracy and human rights it pretends to be. 

From 1619, when the first African slaves arrived in Jamestown, through the next 246 years, almost all Black Americans were slaves. After slavery was abolished, nearly all Black Americans continued to live in poverty subjected to a continuous barrage of federal, state and municipal legislation which institutionalized the post slavery repressive racism in all levels of society including policing, education, housing, voting, healthcare, employment. These laws largely condemned black communities to continual generational poverty.

Even after the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which ended segregation in public places and banned employment discrimination on the basis of race, color, religion, sex or national origin, and the 1965 Voting Rights Act which prohibited voting discrimination based on race, black communities still struggled against the deep-rooted systemic racism and local laws that held them in poverty as second class citizens.

Up until this time almost all police officers were white and across the country systemic racial profiling, biases, and violence was directed toward people of color at alarming rates. These law enforcement practices did not end overnight, and in fact, as we now see, they still have not ended. Black Americans, Indigenous Americans, Latino Americans and other people of color are still affected by embedded racist biases, and laws that are supposed to bring equality are not enforced evenly.

I believe that in order to understand how racism still suppresses and brutalizes our black community you have to look at the whole, complex, scope of systemic inequality. Below I have included a wide variety of web resources from government, media, scholarly, and non-profit sites. I have broken them into categories of: Racism-the historical context; Employment, Income and Wealth; Voting and Politics; Youth, Education and the Juvenile Justice System; Housing; Healthcare; Law enforcement racial profiling and violence; Criminal Justice and Prisons.

I hope you will scan these categories (I know there is a lot of material here and it is exhausting to contemplate reading all of it) and follow the links that interest you so that you can find out more. I welcome your feedback, suggestions and criticism.  For a just and equal world, I wish you all the best, Reinard Knutsen. Black Lives Matter!

2019 U.S. POPULATION

328,239,523

White 251,103,235 76 %

Black 43,984,096 13.4%

https://www.census.gov/quickfacts/fact/table/US/PST045219

RACIAL INEQUALITY: THE HISTORICAL CONTEXT

Lift Black Voices - Spotlight: The Speak Up Series - Conversations to raise awareness on racial inequality in the Black community. https://www.facebook.com/liftblackvoices

The fury in US cities is rooted in a long history of racist policing, violence and inequality - The protests that have engulfed American cities in the past week are rooted in decades of frustrations. Racist policing, legal and extra-legal discrimination, exclusion from the major avenues of wealth creation and vicious stereotyping have long histories and endure today. African Americans have protested against these injustices going back as far as the post-Civil War days in the 1870s.

https://theconversation.com/the-fury-in-us-cities-is...

Race in America: 2019 - More than 150 years after the 13th Amendment abolished slavery in the United States, most U.S. adults say the legacy of slavery continues to have an impact on the position of black people in American society today. https://www.pewsocialtrends.org/.../09/race-in-america-2019/

US black-white inequality in 6 stark charts - The nationwide protests following the death of a black man, George Floyd, at the hands of white police officers has once again shone a spotlight on the long-standing racial divide in the US. This, along with the coronavirus pandemic that has disproportionately killed black Americans, has drawn renewed attention to the persistent inequities in wealth, health and opportunity between blacks and whites despite economic prosperity of recent years. Those disparities exist because of a long history of policies that excluded and exploited black Americans,

https://www.cnn.com/.../black-white-us.../index.html

Resources to understand the long history of injustice and inequality -To help provide context to the issues driving the debate among people attending marches and rallies or those having more quiet conversations with their families and friends, we’ve compiled deeply reported stories, videos, photo essays, audio and graphics on black history, progress, inequality and injustice.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/.../understanding.../...

What A 1968 Report Tells Us About The Persistence Of Racial Inequality - In 1968, they published a provocative report that civil rights leader Jesse Jackson recently called "the last attempt to address honestly and seriously the structural inequalities that plague African Americans." "Segregation and poverty have created in the racial ghetto a destructive environment totally unknown to most white Americans," the Kerner report said. "What white Americans have never fully understood — but what the Negro can never forget — is that white society is deeply implicated in the ghetto. White institutions created it, white institutions maintain it, and white society condones it." Fifty years later, Americans are taking to the streets again, protesting systemic inequities that haven't gone away. How much has really changed? https://www.npr.org/.../what-a-1968-report-tells-us-about...

Divergent Fates: The Foundations of Durable Racial Inequality, 1940-2013 - Few people would deny that African Americans made enormous economic and political gains from the New Deal to the twenty-first century. There is also little doubt that racial inequality remains a formidable problem. From news reports of the dismal employment rates of black men to discussion of the massive incarceration of black men and women to debates over affirmative action and black poverty, Americans are constantly reminded of the unfinished business of the civil rights era. We have not overcome our unequal history.

https://www.demos.org/sites/default/files/imce/Brown.pdf

When talking about racial inequality, don’t forget the gap of black stress - Unpacking racial inequality usually leads to pertinent discussions around disparities in housing, job, and education opportunities—and, of course, the disproportionate use of police force. But what should never get lost in those conversations is the lasting psychological damage all of the above inflict on the black community. This topic was a notable highlight of Tuesday night’s BET News special Justice Now, which kicked off its planned  monthlong exploration of racism and violence against African Americans.

https://www.fastcompany.com/.../when-talking-about-racial...

Racial Inequality After Racism: How Institutions Hold Back African Americans - Many on the political right believe that the United States has become a genuinely colorblind society—a level playing field that rewards discipline and hard work. In this view, racial disparities reflect deficiencies of merit on the part of less successful individuals and groups rather than flawed institutions that perpetuate unequal outcomes. By this logic, the failure of African Americans and other minorities to prosper stems from personal failings, such as a lack of initiative.

https://www.foreignaffairs.com/.../racial-inequality...

Facts About Blacks in the U.S - https://www.pewresearch.org/.../5-facts-about-blacks-in.../

What Hollywood movies do to perpetuate racial stereotypes (2/19) - Cinematic stereotypes reflect and shape common prejudices. Perceptions can be influenced by portrayals of Asians as nerdy, black men as dangerous and Latinas as fiery. So, how does Hollywood portray various groups? https://www.dw.com/.../hollywood-movies.../a-47561660

AFRICAN AMERICAN HISTORY TIMELINE - BlackPast.org, an online reference center makes available a wealth of materials on African American history in one central location on the Internet. These materials include an online encyclopedia of over 4,000 entries, the complete transcript of more than 300 speeches by African Americans, other people of African ancestry, and those concerned about race, given between 1789 and 2016, over 140 full text primary documents, bibliographies, timelines and six gateway pages with links to digital archive collections, African and African American museums and research centers, genealogical research websites, and more than 200 other website resources on African American and global African history. https://www.blackpast.org/african-american-history-timeline/

Black Lives Matter began as a call to action in response to state-sanctioned violence and anti-Black racism. Our intention from the very beginning was to connect Black people from all over the world who have a shared desire for justice to act together in their communities. The impetus for that commitment was, and still is, the rampant and deliberate violence inflicted on us by the state. https://blacklivesmatter.com/

VOTING AND POLITICS

Blacks have made gains in U.S. political leadership, but gaps remain - Data from the past 50 years reveal the upward yet uneven trajectory of black political leadership in America. In 1965, there were no blacks in the U.S. Senate, nor were there any black governors. And only six members of the House of Representatives were black. As of 2019, there is greater representation in some areas – 52 House members are black, putting the share of black House members (12%) on par with the share of blacks in the U.S. population overall for the first time in history. But in other areas, there has been little change (there are three black senators and no black governors). https://www.pewresearch.org/.../blacks-have-made-gains.../

Where Have All the Black Mayors Gone? (12/17) - Until recently, Jacksonville, Memphis, Philadelphia and San Antonio all had black mayors. Now, they’ve all been replaced by white successors. By 2000, 19 of the country’s 50 biggest cities had or would soon have black mayors, Forbes recently reported; by 2017, that number had fallen to six. https://www.governing.com/.../gov-cities-vanishing-black...

Voting Rights - At our nation’s founding, voting was enshrined only for educated white men who owned property. It took more than a century for the franchise to meaningfully expand to people of color, women, people with disabilities, people who are low-income, and Native Americans. Today, some elected leaders are still working to silence people who were historically denied access to the ballot box. https://civilrights.org/value/voting-rights/

EMPLOYMENT, INCOME AND WEALTH

For Juneteenth: A look at economic racial inequality between white and black Americans - In observance of the holiday, the Washington Center for Equitable Growth is highlighting some of the research and analysis that both we and members of our academic network have done to explore both the persistence of economic racial inequality between white and black Americans today and some of the reasons for it.

https://equitablegrowth.org/for-juneteenth-a-look-at.../

Systemic racism has contributed to the persistence of race-based gaps that manifest in many different economic indicators.

The starkest divides are in measures of household wealth, reflecting centuries of white privilege that have made it particularly difficult for people of color to achieve economic security. This series of charts begins with a look at the widening of racial wealth gaps in the United States that have coincided with the extreme concentration of U.S. wealth.

https://inequality.org/facts/racial-inequality/

Systematic Inequality and Economic Opportunity - The U.S. economy was built on the exploitation and occupational segregation of people of color. While many government policies and institutional practices helped create this system, the legacies of slavery, Jim Crow, and the New Deal—as well as the limited funding and scope of anti-discrimination agencies—are some of the biggest contributors to inequality in America. Together, these policy decisions concentrated workers of color in chronically undervalued occupations, institutionalized racial disparities in wages and benefits, and perpetuated employment discrimination. As a result, stark and persistent racial disparities exist in jobs, wages, benefits, and almost every other measure of economic well-being.

https://www.americanprogress.org/.../systematic.../

‘Black People Are Locked Out’: $10 Billion Fund Manager On Race Inequality - John Rogers wants to be clear: corporate America is missing its moment to act on racial inequity. Rogers, 62, is one of the fund industry’s leading African-American figures after founding Ariel Investments nearly four decades ago.  It’s not just rhetoric and donations that will make the difference, said the co-chief executive officer of $10 billion fund manager Ariel Investments, which focuses on value stocks. Businesses need to hire more African-Americans into senior roles -- including board seats and executive suites -- and work with other companies that have diverse leadership, he said. https://www.bloomberg.com/.../-black-people-are-locked...

The economic prospects of Black Americans have stayed largely unchanged for decades. - Here are 12 charts demonstrating alarming rates of inequality.

https://www.businessinsider.com/charts-black-americans...

Five Charts That Will Change The Way You Think About Racial Inequality - Here’s a straightforward question. For the sake of argument, let’s assume that the average white family in the United States has $100. How much money do you think a comparable black family has? The correct answer is less than $10. Most Americans guess upwards of $80. This is the crux of a new article appearing in the journal Perspectives on Psychological Science. Specifically, a team of psychologists led by Michael Kraus of Yale University examined the extent to which people underestimate the degree of racial economic inequality in the United States. Their results are alarming, to say the least. https://www.forbes.com/.../five-charts-that-will.../...

Racial Inequality Trends and the Intergenerational Persistence of Income and Family Structure - Racial disparity in family incomes remained remarkably stable over the past 40 years in the United States despite major legal and social reforms. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4598060/

Racial Inequality: Black Workers Face 'Devastating Job Loss' During The Pandemic, Study Says - Black Americans are disproportionately hard hit by the current loss of jobs. We explore why and what can be done to reverse this trend.

https://www.wbur.org/.../job-loss-black-americans-economy...

Wealth, Income and Inequality - The World Inequality Database aims to provide open and convenient access to the most extensive available database on the historical evolution of the world distribution of income and wealth, both within countries and between countries. https://wid.world/

YOUTH, EDUCATION AND THE JUVENILE JUSTICE SYSTEM

Categorical inequalities between Black and white students are common in US schools—but they don’t have to be (2/20) The Civil Rights Data Collection (CRDC) reports large, persistent gaps between Black and white students on educational outcomes such as school suspensions, uptake of AP classes, assignment to special education and gifted and talented classes, and grade-level retention. https://www.brookings.edu/.../categorical-inequalities.../

Black Students 'Face Racial Bias' In School Discipline (4/19) - Racial bias may be to blame for the greater disciplinary problems black students face at school, according to a new study. Black students are almost four times as likely to be suspended from school as white students, almost three times as likely to be removed from the classroom but kept within school, and almost three times as likely to be expelled. They are also almost three times as likely to be referred to police for an incident on the school grounds, and three-and-a-half times as likely to be arrested for an incident either on school grounds or during school activities. https://www.forbes.com/.../black-students-face-racial.../...

How Racial Stereotypes in popular media affect people (especially children) (6/19) - In 2015, the average U.S. resident consumed traditional and digital media for about 15.5 hours each day. In the same year, eight- to twelve-year-old children consumed an average of six hours of media a day and teens consumed nine hours. This mind-boggling amount of media consumption shapes how U.S. residents see the world, and racial imagery in the media has cumulative effects on society. Often biased media portrayals of racial groups cannot be dismissed as mere entertainment, especially not if their impact on youth are taken seriously https://scholars.org/.../how-racial-stereotypes-popular...

Racial Inequality, at College and in the Workplace (10/19) - White Americans still disproportionately outnumber their African American and Latino counterparts when it comes to obtaining good jobs, regardless of education they have obtained.

https://www.insidehighered.com/.../racial-inequality...

Portrait of Inequality 2012: Black Children in America - The economic crisis of the last five years has pushed Black children and youth deeper and deeper into an abyss of poverty, hunger, homelessness and despair. Black children and youth continue to face multiple risks from birth and throughout life that increase the danger of their becoming part of the Cradle to Prison Pipeline crisis that leads to dead end lives. https://www.childrensdefense.org/.../portrait-of...

Youth Confinement: The Whole Pie 2019  - Demographics and disparities among confined youth. Of the 43,000 youth in juvenile facilities, Black and American Indian youth are overrepresented in juvenile facilities, while white youth are underrepresented.

Troublingly, more than 500 confined children are no more than 12 years old.

https://www.prisonpolicy.org/reports/youth2019.html

In 2019 87% of black Americans ages 25 and older had a high school diploma or equivalent while 94% of whites had high school diplomas. Nationwide, African American children represent 32% of children who are arrested,42% of children who are detained, and 52% of children whose cases are judicially waived to criminal court. https://www.naacp.org/criminal-justice-fact-sheet/

HOUSING

The Gaps Between White and Black America, in Charts - In many parts of the country, black and white Americans continue to live in very different worlds. This distinctive feature of American inequality is not an accidental development but rather a result of policy choices. Our nation’s approach to urban policy has rarely attempted to invest the resources needed to overcome the effects of decades of racial discrimination in struggling neighborhoods. Instead, it has repeatedly made it easier for most white people to isolate themselves in communities that are largely physically separated from communities marked by joblessness, concentrated poverty, environmental hazards, disease and violence. Black neighborhoods are often vital centers of black culture, community and political power. Yet they have not received investments that are customary in white neighborhoods, including well-resourced schools and investments in public services. Instead, they have been subject to injustices and disadvantages such as fraudulent lending practices, housing discrimination and aggressive policing and prosecution. https://www.nytimes.com/.../opportunity-gaps-race...

Redlining’s Legacy Of Inequality: Low Homeownership Rates, Less Equity For Black Households - A decades-old housing policy known as redlining has had a long-lasting effect on American society and the economic health of black households in particular, according to a new report by Redfin real estate brokerage. The racist 1930s-era policy that was outlawed in the 1960s effectively blocked black families from obtaining home loans and remains a major factor in the country’s already substantial wealth gap between black and white families. https://www.forbes.com/.../redlinings-legacy-of.../...

Racial Disparity in Homelessness - Most minority groups in the United States experience homelessness at higher rates than Whites, and therefore make up a disproportionate share of the homeless population. This includes African Americans, American Indians/Alaska Natives, and Native Hawaiians and Pacific Islanders. Hispanics make up a share of the homeless population approximately equal to their share of the general population, and Asians are underrepresented in homelessness.

https://endhomelessness.org/.../what-causes.../inequality/

HEALTHCARE

The enduring history of health care inequality for black Americans - It's tempting to think that the coronavirus pandemic sees no color. This is, after all, a pathogen. A virus. A virus infects a host, and it spreads with no regard for who or what unto it may latch. But the numbers tell a different story—a tale that's a depressing continuation of longstanding health care disparities for people of color in general and black Americans in particular.

https://fortune.com/.../the-enduring-history-of-health.../

Black workers face two of the most lethal preexisting conditions for coronavirus—racism and economic inequality - While it is true that COVID-19 has affected everyone in some way, the magnitude and nature of the impact has been anything but universal. Evidence to date suggests that black and Hispanic workers face much more economic and health insecurity from COVID-19 than white workers.

https://www.epi.org/publication/black-workers-covid/

Racism, Inequality, and Health Care for African Americans - The American health care system in beset with inequalities that have a disproportionate impact on people of color and other marginalized groups. These inequalities contribute to gaps in health insurance coverage, uneven access to services, and poorer health outcomes among certain populations. African Americans bear the brunt of these health care challenges.

https://tcf.org/.../racism-inequality-health-care.../...

Analysis: George Floyd, coronavirus and inequality stealing  Black lives (6/5/20) - After months of a pandemic that has seen African Americans die at almost double their numbers in the U.S. population and generations of police ...

https://publicintegrity.org/.../george-floyd-coronavirus.../

Racial inequalities in COVID-19: the impact on black communities - The current pandemic has taken a disproportionate toll on black people in the United States. The issue of how race-related health inequalities are affecting several disadvantaged groups, and black communities in particular, in the U.S. is very complex and has wide ramifications. COVID-19 has only served to unmask inequities that have existed for hundreds of years.

https://www.medicalnewstoday.com/.../racial-inequalities...

The Black Plague- Thousands of white Americans have also died from the virus, but the pace at which African-Americans are dying has transformed this public-health crisis into an object lesson in racial and class inequality. According to a Reuters report, African-Americans are more likely to die of covid-19 than any other group in the U.S. It is still early in the course of the pandemic, and the demographic data is incomplete, but the partial view is enough to prompt a sober reflection on this bitter harvest of American racism. https://www.newyorker.com/.../our.../the-black-plague

LAW ENFORCEMENT: RACIAL PROFILING AND VIOLENCE

Inside 100 million police traffic stops: New evidence of racial bias -

Stanford researchers found that black and Latino drivers were stopped more often than white drivers, based on less evidence of wrongdoing.

https://www.nbcnews.com/.../inside-100-million-police...

Police stops are still marred by racial discrimination, new data shows. - The Bureau of Justice Statistics released its new report on interactions between police and the public, using survey data from 2015. The report reminds us that police stops and use of force are already racially discriminatory, with predictable consequences for public trust of the police. The report reveals:

·   Black residents were more likely to be stopped by police than white or Hispanic residents, both in traffic stops and street stops.

·   Black and Hispanic residents were also more likely to have multiple contacts with police than white residents, especially in the contexts of traffic and street stops. More than 1 in 6 Black residents who were pulled over in a traffic stop or stopped on the street had similar interactions with police multiple times over the course of the year.

·   When police initiated an interaction, they were twice as likely to threaten or use force against Black and Hispanic residents than white residents.

https://www.prisonpolicy.org/blog/2018/10/12/policing/

For Black Motorists, a Never-Ending Fear of Being Stopped - Minorities are pulled over by police at higher rates than whites. Many see a troubling message: You don't belong. Law-abiding black and Hispanic drivers are often left frightened and humiliated after being stopped by police, who too often see them as criminals. Listen as individuals across the country share their stories.

https://www.nationalgeographic.com/.../the-stop-race.../

Is It Time to Reconsider Traffic Stops? - While traffic stop interactions with the police may be shrugged off as brief inconveniences for whites, for black Americans, they can lead to humiliation, violence, and even death. This has become clear over the last few years, as videos have surfaced, hashtags have trended, and reports have been released—opening up the black box of negative interactions between the police and drivers of color for the world to see.

https://www.bloomberg.com/.../are-traffic-stops-a-pretext...

Police Shootings Database - In 2015, The Washington Post began to log every fatal shooting by an on-duty police officer in the United States. In that time there have been more than 5,000 such shootings recorded by The Post. 1,298 (24%) were Black Americans even though they are 13% of the population.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/.../police-shootings.../

Other notable findings include:

·   Unarmed - Out of the 352 people shot and killed by police who were unarmed

·   123 were black

·   Fleeing - 249 people shot and killed by police while they fled on foot

·   Mental Illness - 1,217 people shot and killed by police who had proven mental illnesses

·   No Body Cams - 1,095 people shot and killed by police have no video recordings

Mapping Police Violence - Black people were 24% of those killed despite being only 13% of the population. The maps and charts on this site aim to provide us with the answers we need. 95 %t of the killings in our database occurred while a police officer was acting in a law enforcement capacity. Importantly, these data do not include killings by vigilantes or security guards who are off-duty police officers. We hope these data will be used to provide greater transparency and accountability for police departments as part of the ongoing campaign to end police violence in our communities. https://mappingpoliceviolence.org/

How do racial biases play into deadly encounters with the police? What the data say about police shootings https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-019-02601-9

2016 ARREST STATISTICS compiled by the FBI: https://ucr.fbi.gov/.../crime.../topic-pages/tables/table-21

In 2016, 8,421,481 (8% of the U.S population) were arrested.

·   5,858,330 were white representing 2.33% of the white population.

·   2,263,112 (more then 2/3 of all arrests) were Black representing 5.14% of the black population.

Arrests for nonviolent offenses:

Disorderly conduct: Total arrested=291,951; White=184,903 (0.07% of the white pop.); Black=94,004 (0.213 of the black pop.)

Vagrancy: Total arrested=19,755; White=13,033         (0.005 of the white pop.); Black=6,063 (0.0137 of the black pop.)

Curfew and loitering law violations: Total arrested=26,948; White=15,162 (0.006 of the white pop.); Black=10,979 (0.024 of the black pop.)

Stolen property; buying, receiving, possessing: Total arrested=74,492; White=47,818 (0.019 of the white pop.); Black=24,851 (0.056 of the black pop.)

Weapons; carrying, possessing, etc.: Total arrested=124,150; White=69,414 (0.027 of the white pop.); Black=51,898 (0.0117 of the black pop.)

Prostitution and commercialized vice: Total arrested=30,322; White=16,819 (0.006 of the white pop.); Black=11,495 (0.026 of the black pop.)

Drug abuse violations: Total arrested=1,242,630; White=881,885 (0.351 of the white pop.); Black=332,131 (0.755 of the black pop.)

Driving under the influence: Total arrested=798,012; White=655,648 (0.261 of the white pop.); Black=108,881 (0.247 of the black pop.)

Vandalism: Total arrested=154,958; White=105,933(0.042 of the white pop.)         Black=43,499 (0.0988 of the black pop.)

All other offenses: (except traffic) Total arrested=2,567,092; White=1,775,423  (0.707 of the white pop.); Black=704,293 (1.601 of the black pop.)

CRIMINAL JUSTICE AND PRISONS

The jail and prison population has increased 500% over the last 40 years to 2.3 million people. In 2019 there were 1,501 black prisoners for every 100,000 black adults In the U.S. black Americans make up 12% of the population but 33% of the prison population. Hispanic make up 16% of the population but 23% of the prison population. Whites make up 60% of the population but only 30% of the prison population. https://www.prisonpolicy.org/reports/pie2020.html

The number of Americans with criminal records is about the same as the number of Americans with a 4-year degree.

·   The American criminal justice system currently holds almost 2.3 million people in 1,719 state prisons, 109 federal prisons, 1,772 juvenile correctional facilities, 3,163 local jails, and 80 Indian Country jails as well as in military prisons, immigration detention facilities, civil commitment centers, state psychiatric hospitals.

·   The U.S. incarcerates more people per capita then any other country in the world at 698 prisoners per 100,000 people. Every year, over 600,000 people enter prison gates, but people go to jail 10.6 million times each year.

·   Today, the United States makes up about 5% of the world’s population and has 21% of the world’s prisoners. 1 in every 37 adults in the United States, or 2.7% of the adult population, is under some form of correctional supervision.

The lifetime likelihood of imprisonment for U.S. Residents Born in 2001:

Black men 1 in 3,  - All men 1 in 9, White men 1 in 17, Latino 1 in 6

Black women 1 in 18,  - All women 1 in 56, White women 1 in 111, Latino women 1 in 45.  https://www.prisonpolicy.org/reports/pie2020.html https://www.sentencingproject.org/criminal-justice-facts/

The Color of Justice – “A justice system which tolerates injustice is doomed to collapse.” Leonard Noisette, quoted in Reducing Racial Disparities in the Criminal Justice System (2000) Critics who claim that racism taints the justice system have cited its treatment of African-American and Hispanic males. For example, a Bureau of Justice Statistics analysis showed that if current incarceration rates remain unchanged, 32 percent of black males and 17 percent of male Latinos born in 2001 can expect to spend time in prison during their lifetime. This compares to only 6 percent of white males who will go to prison. African-Americans make up 12 percent of the U.S. population, but today compose 40 percent of all prison inmates and 42 percent of those sentenced to death.

https://www.crf-usa.org/brown-v.../the-color-of-justice.html

In the U.S. black Americans make up 13% of the population but 33% of the prison population. Hispanic make up 16% of the population but 23% of the prison population. Whites make up 60% of the population but only 30% of the prison population.  https://www.census.gov/quickfacts/fact/table/US/PST045219

Drug Sentencing Disparities - In the 2015 National Survey on Drug Use and Health, about 17 million whites and 4 million African Americans reported having used an illicit drug within the last month. African Americans and whites use drugs at similar rates, but the imprisonment rate of African Americans for drug charges is almost 6 times that of whites. African Americans represent 12.5% of illicit drug users, but 29% of those arrested for drug offenses and 33% of those incarcerated in state facilities for drug offenses. https://www.naacp.org/criminal-justice-fact-sheet/

Effects of Incarceration - A criminal record can reduce the likelihood of a callback or job offer by nearly 50 percent. The negative impact of a criminal record is twice as large for African American applicants. Infectious diseases are highly concentrated in corrections facilities: 15% of jail inmates and 22% of prisoners – compared to 5% of the general population – reported ever having tuberculosis, Hepatitis B and C, HIV/AIDS, or other STDs. In 2012 alone, the United States spent nearly $81 billion on corrections.

Spending on prisons and jails has increased at triple the rate of spending on Pre‐K‐12 public education in the last thirty years. https://www.naacp.org/criminal-justice-fact-sheet/