Sometimes the myths are wrong...

[MrScorpio]

[Warpy]

1. Anything that busts the stereotypes is a good thing

Some years ago, it was noted that black teens were smoking at a much lower rate than their white counterpart. I figured they were smarter if broker. And that was another stereotype gone.

[Major Nikon]

2. NPR had a good piece on this a few months ago

http://www.npr.org/2013/04/23/178601467

[Bernardo de La Paz]

3. Obviously lots of confusion and numbers don't match. Can't all be right.

The graphic says: 164 K in prison or jail and 674 K in college.

Howard prof (post above) says: 840 K in prison and 1400 K in college. (includes men under criminal justice supervision including probation/parole)

The prof did some real digging into the stats and I'll go with his figures for now:

if you look at the representation of black males in college, they represent about 5 percent of the college population. If you look at the adult population of black males in the United States, we represent about 5.5 percent of the adult population. So contrary to popular belief, we aren't under-represented in higher education, but we are under-represented at competitive universities and over-represented at community colleges.

[...] the top 10 colleges for enrolling black males consist of three for-profit colleges, four community colleges and three public, four-year institutions.

Thank to MrScorpio and the poster above for providing a very stimulating topic and information.

[oberliner]

4. These numbers are BS

And they even contradict another image from the same site (which has 734,000 as the number).

[Scurrilous]

5. Thanks.

K & R

[steve2470]

6. good info, thanks for this ! nt

[snooper2]

7. Those numbers are wrong...

doing some simple google searches apparently when President Obama said this in 2007-

“we have more black men in prison than we have in our colleges.”

It kicked off a number of articles and studies, this one so far seems the most accurate-





http://www.acenet.edu/the-presidency/columns-and-features/Pages/By-the-Numbers-More-Black-Men-in-Prison-Than-in-College-Think-Again-.aspx

[Captain Stern]

8. Part of the confusion

might be because it appears that the set of numbers in the OP only apply to black men between the ages of 18-24....not the total population of black men.

[Jim Lane]

9. Reconciling the statistics

Some responses have disputed the OP's statistics. Note that the OP is limited to black men aged 18-24. In that age group, there's a heavy preponderance of college students over prisoners.

The supposedly contrary statistics presented upthread aren't limited by age. I'll guess that, among blacks and among whites, the percentage of students in the 18-24 population is far higher than the percentage in the entire adult population.

As a side note, several years ago I heard a political candidate say that members of Congress had a higher arrest rate than did unemployed black teenagers. I haven't verified that but it wouldn't surprise me in the least.

[freshwest]

10. Spread the word!

[Hekate]

11. Kick. Rec. Thanks, Mr. Scorpio. nt