Memphis Segregation

What does the word poverty mean to you? Why does it tend to always follow black families? Well, one could argue that it is because of the income and family hardship. Many people do not really see what a black family goes through because of not having enough money to pay the light bill, gas bill, or even provide for their own children. However, we do not tend to think of the reason why this happens. Research shows that black household income stood at only 55 percent of white household income in 2011, basically studies shows that black families make half of what a white families makes.

In the United States, people think that all people are equal, but we have come to realize that black people are not equal to white people in many ways. Can it be said that black families do not have the abilities as white families, or that just because blacks and whites do not have the same skin tone that blacks should not have same opportunities and benefits as our counterpart?

The reason why black families do not make enough money to pay for their bills is because of the fact that they make half of what a white family makes. It’s also has to do with the fact that black families are outcast and outnumbered in finance and money budgeting; for example, if you ask black person what they do with their money or how spend their money, most would say on the nells or drugs or even gambling. Research says that over half of what household are owners of 73 percent and black household is less than 15 percent of white household.

Black Poverty

We know that blacks and whites are put in different categories and that blacks make half of whites makes, but what we do not tend to think about is what are the causes of this. Some of these causes rest on characteristics such as age, education, industry occupation, and other factors. We may be thinking how could these be a factor of the reason for the black and white people differences.

Let’s first get to education. We all need education to be someone in life but that does not mean that we all tend to take the time to get our GED or high school diploma. This could lead to students dropping out, more teens on the street, and less in school–increasing poverty. News that gains in education for African Americans did nothing to narrow the income gap pairs distressingly with another number that Memphis journalist and MLK50 founder Wendi Thomas mined from the 2015 federal survey: Blacks comprise 51 percent of Memphis’ workforce. Whites make up 88 percent of Memphis’ executive and senior management personnel.

Second, the age of a person could also be a reason why there’s difference between black and white people. Additionally, because of the age of a person might can determine how you treated like for example, when a person reaches a certain age they are put in a age group.

White Poverty

What is white Poverty? Do white people go through the same thing as black people or are they treated differently? Even though black and white people have always had problems with one another but that do not mean that we should not look into the difficulty that white people go through on a daily base. The first thing that we need to look into are how are whites set up financially, how much do they make per day, do they have problems paying their bills on time, and how many white people are in poverty. The Brookings Institute’s Metro Policy Program released a paper last fall showing how 26 of Nashville’s top 50 occupations — 40 percent of all jobs regionally — didn’t pay employees enough to afford fair-market rent. ‘The number of workers spending more than 30 percent of their income on rent could fill five Nissan stadiums,’ the report stated. For people struggling to survive in Nashville’s metro, living in an exciting and innovative ‘it’ city means fair housing, transportation, employment, and high-performing schools are often beyond reach

Education Differences

The question that is ask a lot is in some segregation communities is why do black and white people have different education system or why they are put on the education levels? Well for starts we need to look at the test scores of the student and determine the difference between black and white student. After see how they are teached and and look at the different classes that are offer at that school. Additionally, we need to also look at the student body number of the students because a school need a certain amount of student for the board of education to send money for extra classes or teachers to provide the students with more classes. According to the U.S. Census Bureau,” the United States spends $11,392 per student every year. This referred to as per pupil current spending (PPCS), varies dramatically by state. Some states spend over $20,000 per student while others spend less than $7,000”.

Trying to fix the problem of student been educated can be hard but not difficult because you have to look at the why’s and how’s of the reason students are not U.S. Education: Still Separate and Unequal passing basic tests and more dropping out because of struggle that they have at home. Article “Educational expectations are lower for black children, according to “Child Trends’, a non-profit and non-partisan research center that tracks data about children. Black parents, most of whom are less educated than their white counterparts, don’t expect their children to attain as much education as white parents expect. Lower expectations become self-fulfilling prophecies, contributing to lower expectations from the student, less-positive attitudes toward school, fewer out-of-school learning opportunities and less parent-child communication about school”.

Community Differences

Before we get into talk about how there is a differences in black and white people communities let’s see why it is. Well for starts, let’s ask ourselves can the black community keep up with their neighborhood or do they have the money to afford other things that is not their bills. Can they treat others right without cause a scene, it is ok have a disagreement but when you take things to the extreme.

Now money, is there enough money for black community to make sure the house is up to part and not broken down. Additionally, there is different amount of money invested into black and white communities and because of that most black communities can no make sure their houses and neighborhoods look the part. ”While things have changed for the better, Entzminger also agrees that Memphis, like most American cities, struggles with equity and leveling the playing field for residents and neighborhoods disadvantaged by generations of segregation, especially in the southern, predominantly black sections of the city. In 2016, the poverty rate in Memphis was almost 27 percent, with half of Memphis’s children living in poverty”. To not realize that we are not playing close attention to our children’s and that there are suffering from the lack of money coming into the community.

Have ever seen how the government shape our black communities to look more like museum because if you go to “Elvis Presley” you would see that it is more like a show cause that a neighborhood. As www.quora.com website states“As for the residential area immediately behind Graceland, it has been largely unaffected by the tourist activities. Some complaints arise because of excessive numbers of tourists on Elvis’ birthday and the anniversary of his death, but not much the rest of the year. (My mother still lives two blocks behind Graceland.) During the 60’s and 70’s, Graceland Subdivision was a solid middle-class neighborhood.

More recently, changing demographics have caused property values to drop, the local elementary school has been torn down and not rebuilt, and the once-thriving Whitehaven Plaza shopping center is a shell of its former self. None of this has been caused by the activities at Elvis’ house”. We have many differences with white people when coming to community because some community is set up to because a low life community that does not have enough money to profit and that is a reason that most black and some white communities become a life filled with poverty that can continue to grow.

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