R.I. among states with narrowest racial divide

The website 24/7 Wall St. said Rhode Island is one of the states with the narrowest racial divide.
The website 24/7 Wall St. said Rhode Island is one of the states with the narrowest racial divide.

PROVIDENCE – Rhode Island is one of the states with the narrowest racial divide, according to a recent report from 24/7 Wall St., which examined equality issues in all 50 states.
Rhode Island is sixth on the list. New Hampshire is the state with the narrowest racial divide, followed by Vermont, Wyoming, New Mexico and Hawaii.
The financial news and opinion company said Rhode Island has a 10.3 percentage point gap between the 10.3 percent white poverty rate and 20.6 percent black poverty rate, which is among the smallest in the country.
It also said that the Ocean State’s black homeownership rate is 11th lowest at 26.8 percent, and that the black unemployment rate is 12.2 percent, tied for fifth highest.
New Hampshire, said 24/7 Wall St., is one of the only states in which a larger share of black adults have high school diplomas than white adults.
“While African Americans are statistically worse off than white Americans in many socioeconomic measures nationwide, the racial divide is narrower in New Hampshire,” 24/7 Wall St. wrote.

24/7 Wall Street said Wisconsin is the worst state for black Americans based on such factors as having the ninth highest black unemployment rate in the U.S., third highest black incarceration rate and 10th lowest black homeownership rate. In addition, only 12.8 percent of black Americans have completed college in Wisconsin.
“The Civil Rights and Voting Rights Acts of 1965 – ending decades of government-sponsored racial oppression and intended to reverse the effects of hundreds of years of slavery – by no means have resolved racial inequality in the United States,” 24/7 Wall St. said.
The website found that there are still wide racial disparities in America and that compared with white people, African Americans are considerably less likely to own their homes, twice as likely to be unemployed, nearly three times as likely to live in poverty, and five times more likely to go to prison.

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