The Underclass

While Wilson acknowledges that most people included in his definition of the underclass are also members of racial and ethnic minorities, he also contends that, by placing the emphasis on racial and ethnic background, both analysts and politicians blur the problem represented by the underclass development, thereby making it more difficult to develop and implement effective solutions to the problem.

Wilson's contentions with respect to an emphasis on racism diverts attention from an emphasis on the underclass, and, thus, causes problems in the development of effective corrective actions are complex. First, he states that, by emphasizing racism, analysts and politicians are able to close their eyes to the facts that crime, drug addiction, teenage pregnancies, femaleheaded families, and welfare dependency are not only more prevalent among racial and ethnic minorities, but are, in fact, linked in causal ways with racial and ethnic background. In fact, Wilson contends that both white apolog

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nderclass. The outcomes that Gans assumes need not occur, and, indeed, have not characterized the past composition of the underclass in the United States. As an example, the Chinese, Irish, Jews, and Italians, as major racial and ethnic components of the underclass, moved beyond the underclass designation. Further, even when these racial and ethnic groups were well represented in American underclass, individual persons and families within these racial and ethnic designations moved out of the underclass, although they may have been replaced by other individuals and families of the same racial and ethnic background. Kerner question The Kerner Report, officially The 1968 Report of the National Advisory Commission on Civil Disorders, made a large number of recommendations that covered a wide spectrum of problems. An assessment of the action by American society on these recommendations is as follows: Jobs: 1. Under the Nixon Administration (the administration assumed power the year following release of the Kerner Report), an effort was made to consolidate federal, state, and local manpower programs. 2. Rather than creating twomillion new jobs, 900 thousand jobs were lost in the civilian economy through 1971. 3. Onthe
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Some common words found in the essay are:
Bush Administrations, , Irish Jews, Civil Disorders, Kerner Report, Bush Administration, Reagan Administration, Los Angeles, Nixon Administration, United Gans, racial ethnic, los angeles, reagan administration, bush administration, individuals families, nixon administration, social outcomes, program expanded, street gangs, term underclass, racial ethnic background, mainstream american occupational, central los angeles, american occupational system, racial ethnic minorities,
Approximate Word count = 3165
Approximate Pages = 13 (250 words per page)

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