Investing in Our Disconnected Youth

For some time now Black voters have supported African-American elected members of Congress in the hope that they would ascend to power and be better positioned to address critical issues of concern to our community. The 2006 mid-term elections elevated many members of the Congressional Black Caucus (CBC) to key committee chairmanships, with our own Rep. Charles Rangel guiding the powerful Committee on Ways & Means in the House of Representatives. We are at a watershed moment as many of our elected officials in Congress are positioned to influence public policy like no other time in our history.

Like his colleagues in the CBC, the congressman is exploring opportunities to address long festering issues that have plagued our community for some time. One such concern is the lack of opportunity for millions of young adults who are not in school and out of work. The Community Service Society (CSS) has examined the problem of so-called "disconnected youth" and determined the extent these young people, age 16 to 24 years old, have found themselves outside the school walls and out of a job. We were alarmed when our research indicated there are 200,000 young people in New York City alone who fit this profile; with estimates from the National League of Cities of between 5 and 6 million "disconnected youth" across the nation.

Enter Congressman Rangel. For some time now the congressman has told me that he is troubled by what is happening to our young people. In fact, as soon as he became chairman of the Committee on Ways & Means he made it a point to remind me that he was committed to finding a way to make certain that "disconnected youth" would have an opportunity to earn a decent living. His own personal experience of having left school early and using military service to gain credible skills has motivated the congressman to consider alternative ways in which today’s youth who drop out of school might have an opportunity to earn a decent living.

Most importantly Congressman Rangel has used his influence to persuade corporate America to consider that it too has a stake in these young people. It is a significant moment because too often the business community has failed to acknowledge the long-term impact on our nation’s economy when young adults are not equipped with meaningful skills and gainfully employed. In an age of global competition, can any American business afford to waste the labor and talent of millions of our nation’s youth?

A Global Issue

While this is a national issue, it also reverberates around the globe. Go to many cities abroad – London, Johannesburg, and Paris - and I will guarantee that you will find young people who are virtually invisible, totally severed from the economic mainstream – just like in New York, Chicago, and Los Angeles.

Corporate America must realize that it is in its interests to invest in our youth. Our country has a large and growing population of young people, most of them Black and Latino, who are not in the education system and have never entered the job market. During the next twenty years, the number of Americans in the national workforce is projected to grow at only half the rate it did during the previous twenty years. The number of graduates of four-year colleges is expected to remain stagnant.

We have the raw human capital needed to meet this labor shortage, but too many of our young people end up in prison, or entrapped in the criminal justice system, fall victim to violence or are simply idle. Our nation cannot continue to ignore the millions of young people who are estranged from our labor market if we have any hope of remaining a global economic power in the 21st century.

Landmark Meeting

Against the backdrop of this crisis, a landmark meeting of the Business Roundtable, corporate America’s advocacy voice, took place in New York City earlier this month to discuss ways to develop new initiatives that would bridge the substantial gap between America’s global business interests and our most disadvantaged youth. The meeting was held at the request of Congressman Rangel, who was accompanied by Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, Ken Chenault, CEO and Chairman of American Express, Kathy Wylde, the CEO of the Partnership for New York City and education consultant, Ted Gershon. In the audience was a who’s who of the nation’s private sector.

Several proposals developed by the Partnership and the Community Service Society were put forth at this meeting. The intention is to translate some or all of them into federal legislation that will generate federal funds to engage non-profit groups and the private sector in programs that provide training and job opportunities for "disconnected youth" who are seeking to enter the workforce.

Here are a few ideas that could make a difference.

1. Provide employers with a federal tax credit to encourage hiring disconnected youth who face barriers to employment and young offenders who are convicted of a felony or misdemeanor and on parole, probation, or have completed their sentence.
2. Make Earned Training Tax Credit available to businesses that commit in advance to hire a certain number of Work Opportunity Tax Cedit-approved job candidates from the "disconnected youth" category. These companies could either provide entry-level training themselves, through their suppliers or contract with a nonprofit organization to provide such training.

There are other possible proposals. The Committee on Ways and Means is considering how to enhance tax treatment for charitable investments focused on disconnected youth. Another proposal calls for a National Education Endowment Trust that offers tax credit incentives for corporate contributions toward workforce development efforts targeting youth, while another promising idea would have the federal government provide matching funds to encourage states to invest in disconnected youth.

Vital ingredient
is political will

These are just a handful of examples that illustrate the growing concern of private sector investors in the challenges facing the American workforce and the need to do something to make it larger, stronger, and more competitive in the global economy. A federal commitment to new initiatives is urgently needed to reinforce and stimulate additional private investment and achieve meaningful results.

The vital ingredient in this mix – as always – is the political will to follow through and craft these ideas into reality. The meeting that spawned these proposals was attended by individuals representing some of the most powerful and influential organizations in America and occurred because of Congressman Rangel’s leadership in the House of Representatives. Next steps must be a shared commitment, agenda and action by the corporate community and the unprecedented political leadership of New York to create a blueprint for the future for “disconnected youth” in New York and across the nation.

From the New York Amsterdam News
October 18 - 24, 2007