Friday's jobs report was disappointing, but it also contained a truly heartbreaking statistic. Black teen unemployment is a shocking 41.6%. In July last year, the unemployment was considerably lower, at 36%. That almost half of black teens who want to work can't find jobs is a stain on Obama's economic policies.Nor is it any wonder that black kids are especially hurt since in areas of high black population density there are relatively few businesses in the first place.
This isn't a numbers trick. This isn't a rate based on the whole black teen population in the country. This is the proportion of the black teen population that is looking for work but can't find a job. Just in March, the number was eight points lower at 33%. The white teen unemployment rate is half the black rate, although still high at 20%.
If Mr. Obama truly wants to improve the employment prospects of black teens, and everyone else, he simply has to reverse his lethal policies on business and carbon. He has to allow companies to unleash their economic energy without having to fear the next EPA regulation, or the next new tax, or the absurd disincentives under Obamacare to hire the marginal worker.
Unfortunately, Mr. Obama appears to be waging economic jihad against the capitalist goose that has laid the golden eggs. He's not going to give up his struggle to cripple the most productive economy in the history of the world, even if it means that almost half of black kids are denied an opportunity to develop skills and a work ethic needed to succeed in the workplace. To paraphrase Lenin, if you want to make a socialist omelet some eggs have to be sacrificed.
Mr. Obama sometimes seems to be Lenin with a charming smile. It's dismaying that so few in the black community are able to see it, or care enough to oppose what he's doing.