Dr Kings Vision of Economic and Social Justice Essay -- Martin Luther

Not many folks remember that the 1963 March on capital of the United States was officially named March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom. This fact often gets lost amid the important celebration of the general achievement and highlights such as the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.s I Have a Dream oration. Indeed, the theme of railway line creation runs though Dr. Kings writings. Perhaps no single policy could demand as great a social and economical impact on the African American communityand the entire countryas federally funded job assurance for every person ready and willing to work. This is a policy approach that was explicitly supported by Dr. King, and that is currently receiving attention in economic and policy circles.In an article in Look published just after his assassination (King, 1968), Dr. King wrote that We call our demonstration a campaign for jobs and income because we timber that the economic question is the most crucial that black people, and poor people genera lly, are confronting. Thirty-three years later, at the peak of a peacetime economic involution heralded as the longest and strongest in recent history, not only is the African American unemployment rate stuck at twice that of whites, but at nearly 8% that figure remains at a rate that would be considered evidence of a deep recession were it to hold for society as a wholeThere is a literal depression in the Negro community. When you have mass unemployment in the Negro community, its called a social enigma when you have mass unemployment in the white community, its called a depression. The fact is, there is a major depression in the Negro community. The unemployment rate is exceedingly high, and among Negro youth, it goes up as high as forty percent in some cities. (Kin... ...ew, 15, April. Other Works CitedDarity, Jr., William A. Darity and Samuel L. Myers, Jr. (with Emmett D. Carson and William Sabol), 1994, The Black Underclass unfavorable Essays on Race and Unwantedness, Ne w York Garland.Darity, Jr., William A. and Derrick Hamilton, 2001, A Test of the Functionality of Discrimination, presented at Allied Social Science Annual Meetings, New Orleans, January. Other Work on popular Service Job AssuranceCarlson, Ellen, and William F. Mitchell, 2000, The Path to Full Employment and Equity, ELRR Economic and Labour Relations Review,Supplement to Volume 11.Warner, Aaron, Mathew Forstater, and Sumner Rosen, 2000, Commitment to Full Employment, Armonk, N.Y. M. E. Sharpe.Wray, L. Randall, 1998, Understanding upstart Money The Key To Full Employment and Price Stability, Cheltenham, U.K. Edward Elgar.