Potus says the stock market is just taking a little pause.

[Pete F.]

The Trump administration is bragging about the growth in the U.S. economy but things are not looking as good for the Black community: our unemployment is on the rise.

The U.S. economy grew at a rate of 4.1 percent in the second quarter and was “up from 2.2 percent in the first three months of the year,” The New York Times reported. It was the strongest quarter of growth since 2014. In addition, consumer spending increased 4 percent but private investment decreased slightly as “the housing market cooled.”

The economic growth, however, should not be expected to be long-lasting, The New York Times also reported.

“The second-quarter acceleration was widely anticipated by economists, a result of a confluence of events unlikely to recur,” the report read.

One event is mounting trade tensions that “led foreign buyers to stock up on American products before their governments imposed tariffs.” Also, a rise in government spending was linked to a budget deal that Congress passed this year.

“Federal spending rose at a 3.5 percent rate in the second quarter,” the report said. “The effects of the spending deal won’t be quite as short-lived as the trade bump, but they are likewise temporary; economists think the impact on growth will peak late this year.”

While the economy is doing better for now but this isn’t the same for the Black community. As we all know, the Black unemployment has been at an all-time low due to policies that have rolled over from the Obama administration, however, that number is slowing ticking up.

“The national unemployment rate for African Americans inched up in June to 6.5%, after hitting an all-time low of 5.9% in May,” Forbes reported.”Many African American households are worse off than they were 30 years ago.”

The Black unemployment rate is almost double the 3.5 percent unemployment rate for whites and 4.6 percent for Hispanics. About eight percent of African-American homeowners lost their properties to foreclosure from 2007 to 2009, according to estimates from the Center for Responsible Lending. Also, only 43 percent of Black people owned homes in 2017, according to an annual report from the Joint Center for Housing Studies of Harvard University.”

Nonetheless, the facts will probably not stop Trump from spitting out myths of how he has helped the Black community.

NewsOne staff