Employment and Training Institute research has focused on labor market issues for African Americans, Hispanics and other non-white populations as critical to addressing housing integration and economic concerns in local communities. The Institute has prepared a series of report cards on hiring practices and challenges for Milwaukee area companies and governments, provides customized tables showing diversity (and non-diversity) of employment by place-of-work and residence for every U.S. census tract, and offers critiques of the paradyms imbedded in academic measures of segregation in housing.

• Report Card on African American and Minority Participation in Construction Trade Apprenticeships in the Milwaukee Area: A Two-Year Progress Report (2008)

  Updated report card, prepared collaboratively with the NAACP Milwaukee Branch, examines progress in hiring of minority and female apprentices by Milwaukee area construction trade companies. 85 companies increased their hires of African American apprentices since the NAACP issued its first report card in 2006.

• How to Use ETI Drill Downs to Map Employment Integration and to Assess Workforce Diversity at Government Jobsites [in PDF]

  This report uses place-of-work data from the 2000 U.S. Census, released in 2004 and 2005 and designed for transportation planners, to assess and compare employment patterns by race/ethnicity at 1,554 federal, state and local government jobsites in the Milwaukee metro area. The report offers a first-time analysis of the presence of minorities at specific government worksites and assesses the extent to which larger government sites meet availability standards typically used by the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) and the Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs (OFCCP) for the enforcement of anti-discrimination laws and affirmative action requirements placed on federal contractors.

  The report offers examples of the following:

  • Maps of jobsites for African Americans and Hispanics, compared to whites (for the federal, state and local governments).
    
  • Numbers of government jobsites meeting availability standards for employment of minorities.
  • Reports on the diversity record of the largest 25 government worksites in the metro area.
  • Methodology for targeting opportunities for increased employment of minorities and affirmative action efforts by government and worksite.

• Employer Diversity Drill Downs for All Census Tracts in the U.S.

  This website allows users to identify the race/Hispanic origin of the workforce employed in each U.S. census tract by industry, occupation, and type of employer. The data offers a first-time examination of the Census Transportation Planning Package (CTPP2000) place-of-work data from the perspective of central city neighborhoods and minority populations seeking greater business and employment opportunities. Tables (which can be requested for individual or groups of census tracts) also show the earnings of workers employed in each neighborhood by race/ethnicity and by age, the poverty status of workers by means of transportation to work. Populations analyzed include African Americans, Hispanics, Asians, and whites.

• Assumptions and Limitations of the Census Bureau Methodology Ranking Racial and Ethnic Residential Segregation in Cities and Metro Areas (in PDF format).

  This paper by Lois Quinn responds to a request from the U.S. Census Bureau to serve on a five-member peer review panel exmaining a detailed study by the Bureau ranking major metro areas by their level of racial and ethnic housing segregation. The paper raises concerns about definitions of race used for the study, the "white reference" perspectives imbedded in the indexes selected, the choice of census tracts (rather than blocks), and the reliance on metropolitan statistical area boundaries as proxies for housing markets. The study also raises questions about the diversion of federal resources to ranking studies while the release dates for basic Census Bureau data (including the 2000 Census PUMS data and more recently, the ZIP Code Statistics for the 2002 Economic Census) are delayed.

  The Census Bureau study on Racial and Ethnic Segregation in the United States: 1980-2000is available on the Census Bureau website in HTML format or in PDF format. A summary of the panel findings discussing the methodology used is available on the Census Bureau Housing Patterns website.

• Racial Integration in Urban America: A Block Level Analysis of African American and White Housing Patterns, available in HTML format or PDF format .

  This study raises questions about the white-black dissimilarity index historically used to rank metropolitan areas and its assumptions about the lack of integration occurring in many cities with large African American populations. The study includes preliminary development of alternative measures of integration -- which view white and other racial/ethnic populations as equal partners in the integrating process -- as a first step toward articulating measures that might assist cities in identifying the strengths and weaknesses of their population mixes. In the City of Milwaukee, for example, one-fifth (21.6 percent) of all residents live on blocks that are black-white racially mixed -- that is, where African Americans make up at least 20 percent of the population and where whites make up at least 20 percent of the population as well. Outside of the City of Milwaukee, less than 1 percent of residents in the metro area lived on black-white integrated blocks.

• Maps of the African American and White Populations in the 100 Largest Metro Areas

  For the 100 largest metro areas in the U.S., the Employment and Training Institute offers 400 maps showing the integrated, predominantly African American, and predominantly white neighborhoods, based on 2000 Census data.

Related Studies

• Planning Document for Employers: Changing Demographics of the Milwaukee Metro Labor Force, available in HTML format or PDF format .

  The future of the Milwaukee metro labor force lies in large part with its minority populations. Metro Milwaukee has the youngest African American population among the 100 largest metro areas in the U.S. Its Asian population is 4th youngest and its Latino population is 9th youngest. By contrast, the white population is older than in most metro areas, and many white baby boomers are reaching retirement age. Major challenges will be to replace retiring workers with younger trained workers from Milwaukee and to attract professionals to the metro area from other parts of the U.S. Successfully educating African American and Latino youth is imperative for the health of the metro economy.

• Confronting Anti-Urban Marketing Stereotypes: A Milwaukee Economic Development Challenge

  An examination of products promoted by national marketing firms indicated that many firms used racial and class-based stereotypes to describe urban neighborhoods. For example, international firms' websites claimed that African Americans in Milwaukee "splurge on fast food and spend leisure time going to bars and dancing," that Milwakee Hispanics "splurge on videos, long-distance phone calls, cable TV, and theme parks and casino visits," while upper-income white residents were described as "interested in civic activities, volunteer work, contributions and travel." This report compares the spending per square mile by central city residents in racially mixed and non-white neighborhoods with spending in suburban areas to show the concentrated buying power of central city residents.

• Purchasing Power Profiles for City of Milwaukee and Metro Area Suburban ZIP Codes

  Using a state-of-the-art methodology, the Employment and Training Institute prepared purchasing power comparisons for central city neighborhoods denigrated by anti-urban, anti-racial stereotypes. The reports, prepared for the City of Milwaukee, show the purchasing power strength of dense urban neighborhoods for common retail items.

  The Institute now makes consumer expenditure data available (without stereotypes) for all ZIP codes and census tracts in the U.S. to assist underserved neighborhoods and minority businesses in identifying spending power of urban markets. Customized printouts may be secured from the ETI Urban Purchasing Power/Workforce Density Page.

• Neighborhood Indicators of Employment and Economic Well-Being of Families in Central City Milwaukee Neighborhoods

  Employment and Training Institute neighborhood indcators reports, prepared since 1998, identify issues of special concerns to African American and Latino populations. The number of central city residents with driver's license suspensions for failure to pay fines and civil forfeitures continued to show all-time increases, with 4 times as many central city residents losing their licenses over fines (51,135 in 2002) than for traffic violations, driving while intoxicated, and drug convictions combined. State and municipal policies continue to draw African American males into the court system for this "driving while poor" offense.

  The neighborhood indicators also showed very low claim rates for the Earned Income Tax Credit (41 percent for income-eligible married tax filers) for families on Milwaukee's near southside, where many Hispanics reside. Policy recommendations are provided for these and other issues.