Roots of American Socioeconomic Disparity?
Some links. I hope, agree or disagree (I'm OTOH-BOTOH, I guess), you find them interesting:
Slavery ... cannot explain the difference between American blacks and West Indian blacks living in the United States because the ancestors of both were enslaved. When race, racism, and slavery all fail the empirical test, what is left?
Culture is left.
Disparities between Southern whites and Northern whites extended across the board from rates of violence to rates of illegitimacy. American writers from both the antebellum South and the North commented on the great differences between the white people in the two regions. So did famed French visitor Alexis de Tocqueville.
A criticism of Sowell (the above paragraph):
This tropical farming system causes African cultures to tend toward polygamy and/or matrilineal-matrilocal family structures. These tendencies can still be seen among African-Americans.
An (indirect) criticism of the criticism of Sowell:
In 1940, illegitimacy among blacks was 19 percent. From 1890 to 1940, blacks had a marriage rate slightly higher than whites. As of 1950, 64 percent black males 15 years and older were married, compared to today's 41 percent.
If I could find a critique of a critique of a critique, I would have posted it here.
Slavery ... cannot explain the difference between American blacks and West Indian blacks living in the United States because the ancestors of both were enslaved. When race, racism, and slavery all fail the empirical test, what is left?
Culture is left.
Disparities between Southern whites and Northern whites extended across the board from rates of violence to rates of illegitimacy. American writers from both the antebellum South and the North commented on the great differences between the white people in the two regions. So did famed French visitor Alexis de Tocqueville.
A criticism of Sowell (the above paragraph):
This tropical farming system causes African cultures to tend toward polygamy and/or matrilineal-matrilocal family structures. These tendencies can still be seen among African-Americans.
An (indirect) criticism of the criticism of Sowell:
In 1940, illegitimacy among blacks was 19 percent. From 1890 to 1940, blacks had a marriage rate slightly higher than whites. As of 1950, 64 percent black males 15 years and older were married, compared to today's 41 percent.
If I could find a critique of a critique of a critique, I would have posted it here.