Chicago was one of the main destinations of the 20th -century Great Migration by Blacks from the Jim Crow. It was a beacon of hope shining south along the tracks of the Illinois Central Railroad to the Delta. But these days, the Second City’s light of hope for Black children has been nearly extinguished.
Today the 860,000 African Americans in Chicago are much less than half as likely to have a college education than White residents of the city, more than twice as likely to be unemployed, almost twice as likely not be in the labor force at all, much less likely to be in management or professional occupations, much more likely to be in service occupations. Black household incomes are half those of White households, the poverty rate of Black individuals is more than twice that of White individuals and the poverty rate of Black families nearly three times as high...