Kevin Schmiesing
by on Wednesday, April 25, 2007

Jerry Bowyer at NRO highlights a remarkable statistic with this “BuzzChart”: The unemployment rate among black Americans has fallen 2.7 percentage points since April 2003 (the data come from the National Urban League’s annual “State of Black America” report).

Bowyer chalks it up to Bush’s tax cuts. I’ve no doubt the tax cuts have had a positive impact on the national economy, but I’m not sure that the drop can be simply tied to that cause. Overall unemployment, for example, has declined less steeply, and wouldn’t the effects of the tax cut be more or less uniform across race? I wonder whether anyone has analyzed this phenomenon more closely. In any case, it’s a development to applaud.

  • http://www.redclaycommerce.com Jefferson Otwell

    This is certainly a development worthy of applause. Although I am not wedded to the proposition that the effects of tax cuts must necessarily fall evenly across all demographic groups, that different groups experienced different rates points to other causes. Any other causes would belie Bowyer’s assertion that the reason for this drop in unemployment rates rests solely upon those tax cuts.

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