NATION & WORLD
Monday, July 15, 2013 THE NEW MEXICAN
A-3
Demographic change amplifies racial inequities By Suzanne Gamboa
The Associated Press
WASHINGTON — One-yearold Ka’Lani is so fascinated by a round plastic toy that she doesn’t see her mother, Ke’sha Scrivner, walk into the Martha’s Table day care, chanting her name while softly clapping out a beat that Ka’Lani keeps with a few bounces on her bottom. Once on welfare, Scrivner worked her way off by studying early childhood education and landing a full-time job for the District of Columbia’s education superintendent. She sees education as the path to a better life for her and her five children, pushing them to finish high school and continue with college or a trade school. Whether her children can beat the statistics that show lagging graduation rates for black children is important not just to her family. The success of Ka’Lani and other minority children who will form a new majority is crucial to future U.S. economic competitiveness. A wave of immigration, the aging of non-Hispanic white women beyond child-bearing years and a new baby boom are diminishing the proportion of children who are white. Already, half of U.S. children
younger than 1 are Hispanic, black, Asian, Native American or of mixed races. “A lot of people think demographics alone will bring about change and it won’t,” said Gail Christopher, who heads the W.K. Kellogg Foundation’s America Healing project on racial equity. “If attitudes and behaviors don’t change, demographics will just mean we’ll have a majority population that is low-income, improperly educated, disproportionately incarcerated with greater health disparities.” In 2010, 39.4 percent of black children, 34 percent of Hispanic children and 38 percent of American Indian and Alaska Native children lived in poverty, defined as an annual income of $22,113 that year for a family of four. That compares with about 18 percent of white, non-Hispanic children, according to Census Bureau’s 2011 American Community Survey. Asian children overall fare better, with 13.5 percent living in poverty, the survey said. The overrepresentation of minority children among the poor is not new. What is new is that minority children will, in the not-too-distant future, form the core of the nation’s workforce, and their taxes will be depended
school systems, leading to lower graduation rates and lower lifetime earnings, said Leonard Greenhalgh, a professor of management at Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth College in New Hampshire. “You are looking at the future workforce of the United States — what we need to be competitive against rival economies such as India and China, and we are not educating the largest, fastest growing percentage of the U.S. workforce, so as a nation we lose competitive advantage,” Greenhalgh said. It all starts with preschool, Ke’sha Scrivner, left, picks up her daughter Ka’Lani Scrivner, 1, from day care Tuesday in Washington. Scrivner sees eduwhere overall enrollment has cation as the path to a better life for herself and all five of been increasing but Hispanic her children. ALEX BRANDON/THE ASSOCIATED PRESS children are less likely to be included. Of Hispanic children ages 3 to 5 in the U.S., 13.4 peron to keep solvent entitlement recovering. cent were enrolled in full-day programs for the elderly. The Pew Charitable Trusts public or private nursery school Based on where things stand found that, from 1999 to 2009, in 2011, according to data from for nonwhite children today, 23 percent of black families and the National Center for Educait’s not hard to make some 27 percent of Hispanic families tion Statistics. educated guesses about what experienced long-term unemThat compares with 25.8 perthe future holds for the youngployment, compared with est of America’s children who 11 percent of white families. Pew cent of black children enrolled in full-day preschool and 18.1 already are a majority of their Research Center, a subsidiary, percent of white children. But, age group, said Sam Fulwood found that the median wealth of III, a senior fellow at the Center white households is 20 times that Hispanics are one-quarter of stufor American Progress. of black households and 18 times dents enrolled in public schools. Sheila Smith, early childhood The recent recession worsthat of Hispanic households. director at Columbia University’s ened conditions for many chilThat means more minority dren, but minorities were hard National Center for Children families end up in poor neighhit and are having more difficulty borhoods with underperforming in Poverty, points research that
Immigration opponents turn to House NumbersUSA plans lobbying to stop population growth
amnesty. “Believe me, we are expecting a fight,” Beck said later. Beck heads NumbersUSA, perhaps the most powerful advocacy group opposing the By Brian Bennett immigration overhaul. Its politiand Joseph Tanfani cal muscle comes from tens of McClatchy Tribune thousands of devoted supporters who can be mustered at short WASHINGTON — The day notice to protest at public gatherafter the Senate passed its immi- ings and to swarm congressional gration bill in June, leading oppo- offices with angry phone calls nent Roy H. Beck convened his and faxes. top strategists to discuss what Beck says the group will went wrong and to plan ways to mount a full-scale assault on stop the bill from becoming law. the Republican-led House, They brainstormed for over where immigration reform two hours on how to derail any is far less popular than in the talk in the House of legalizing Senate. The plan is likely to millions of undocumented immi- include a fax and phone blitz, grants — which Beck and his targeted TV ads in some dissupporters view as unacceptable tricts, encouraging supporters
to speak out at town hall meetings, and other lobbying efforts. Pro-immigration forces, including some Republicans, are fighting to hold the group in check. They note that NumbersUSA, which shares a $6.5 million budget with a related foundation, seeks to drastically cut both illegal and legal immigration with the goal of stopping U.S. population growth. Some of NumbersUSA’s money comes from groups that support Planned Parenthood and other proabortion-rights groups, as well as environmental organizations that work on climate change. “They are influential because they are masking themselves as conservative,” said Alfonso Aguilar, executive director of the
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Latino Partnership for Conservative Principles. “Say where you stand on population control and global warming. You will see the reaction with conservatives. That’s the problem. The dishonesty.” Critics on both sides say NumbersUSA’s clout has waned as public opinion has shifted. Last month’s 68-32 vote in the Senate to approve immigration reform proved that, they say. “While NumbersUSA might credit themselves with killing immigration reform in 2007, they can also credit themselves with helping Republicans lose the 2012 election” because of its hard-line stance, said Domenic Powell, senior organizer for Center for New Community, a Chicago-based advocacy group.
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changes after a Democratic voters are by their very nature filibuster derailed the measure moderate; they want solutions, and drew national attention last not ideological warfare.” ATLANTA — With no immeThe House of Representatives month. The legislature passed diate hope of overturning the the bill Friday, and it’s headed to adopted a 20-week ban in June. U.S. Supreme Court’s decision Perry’s desk. It has no chance of passing the legalizing abortion, RepubliRick Santorum, a failed 2012 Democratic-run Senate. A top cans around the country are presidential candidate who’s anti-abortion lobbyist, National increasingly pushing legislation considering another run, has Right to Life Committee presito restrict the procedure, and traveled to Texas to lobby for the dent Carol Tobias, told The Democrats say they’ll make the bill. Perry, meanwhile, is among Associated Press that her orgaGOP pay in coming elections. nization is working on a bill with several anti-abortion governors From statehouses to Congress, mulling a presidential bid. Scott the office of Republican Sen. Republicans have advanced a Walker in Wisconsin recently Marco Rubio of Florida, who is range of ideas: banning nearly all signed a bill requiring ultraa high-profile possibility for the abortions beyond the 20th week sounds before abortions, though 2016 presidential race. after conception; making abora federal judge blocked the law. North Carolina’s newfound tion clinics follow regulations Louisiana’s Bobby Jindal has for surgical care; mandating that legislative supermajority wants signed several more restrictive to regulate clinics more heavily. clinic physicians have admitbills, including two these year. Pat McCrory, the Republican ting privileges at local hospitals; According to the Guttmacher governor announced late Friday requiring women to get ultrahe would sign an updated abor- Institute, which works on reprosounds before terminating a ductive health issues including tion regulation bill if it reaches pregnancy. abortion-rights, states this year his desk, saying a legislator The issue, which is figuring have enacted at least 43 new prominently in early 2016 White had addressed concerns about laws that restrict or further regurestricting a woman’s access. House race maneuvering, enerlate abortion. That comes after Texas Gov. Rick Perry called gizes social conservatives who more than 120 new laws, several influence many Republican pri- his GOP legislature back into held up by federal courts, the maries and drive GOP success in session to consider a 20-week previous two years. ban and sweeping regulatory nonpresidential years when the electorate is older, whiter and more conservative. And some Republicans say more moderate voters will support their agenda INC. in the wake of the murder conviction against Kermit Gosnell, the Philadelphia abortion doctor whom jurors determined killed babies who’d survived the procedure. Over 30 years experience in roof repair But Democrats and abortionrights advocates say Republicans Michael A. Roybal 505-438-6599 already have overreached — the www.southwestplasteringcompany.com noticeable uptick in restrictions began with GOP gains in 2010 elections, before Gosnell’s prosecution began — and that moderate voters have other priGo Painlessly® with THERA-GESIC. orities. “Defense workers are being furloughed, student loan interMaximum strength est rates have doubled and these analgesic creme for Republicans insist on a relenttemporary relief from: less pursuit of more restrictions • Joint and Muscle on women’s freedoms,” said Rep. soreness Steve Israel, chairman of the • Arthritis Democrats’ national congres• Back aches sional campaign for 2014. “Swing The Associated Press
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show kindergarteners perform better if they received highquality early care, and if teachers used specific strategies aimed at developing behavior and language and math skills. “If you have minority children from low-income families in very enriched preschool settings … we see they make very big gains,” Smith said. Compounding the issue, experts say, is immigration status. About 4.5 million children of all races born in the U.S. have at least one parent not legally in the U.S., according to the Pew Hispanic Center. More than twothirds of impoverished Latino children are the children of at least one immigrant parent, the center reported. Latino and Asian immigrants over the past two decades are driving a big portion of the demographic change, and ensuring their children can succeed is critical, said Brookings Institution demographer William Frey. “They’re the future of our labor force. They’re the future of our economy,” Frey said. “They’re the people who white baby boomers are going to have to depend on for their Social Security, for their Medicare and just for a productive economy to keep all of us going in the future.”
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