VIEWPOINTS : BLACK AMERICA: TALE OF TWO NATIONS : Cold, Hard Statistics Belie Advances of Black Bourgeoisie

When the National Urban League released its annual State of Black America report last month, it once again faulted the Reagan Administration for cutting social programs and deepening black poverty.

The League’s gloomy report keeps alive the misleading notion that there has been little improvement in the wealth and status of Black America.

This economic statist view of blacks has become embedded in the thinking of Americans with barely a ripple of dissent. Part of the blame for this mistaken picture unfortunately must be shared by black writers.

The best example is the seminal work by black sociologist E. Franklin Frazier, “The Black Bourgeoisie,” written 31 years ago.

Frazier concluded that blacks had no wealth or power of any consequence and that the prospects of their gaining any were virtually nonexistent.

Frazier was especially brutal in his denunciation of blacks in business and the professions. He accused them of exaggerating their economic position and fostering illusions about the prospects of black progress.

By viewing the economic glass for blacks as half empty, Frazier then, and the Urban League today, ignores too much. While poverty, high unemployment and social misery continue to ravage millions of blacks, a prosperous and expanding black professional and business class has emerged as a potent force in America. This new black bourgeoisie has made steady, even spectacular gains through both the booms and busts of the last decade. To understand the place and importance of the new black bourgeoisie, it is first necessary to debunk some old myths.

Welfare: According to 1980 Census figures, fewer than 40% of blacks receive public assistance. Further, a 1985 study by the University of Michigan’s Panel of Income Dynamics found that three out of four young black women from homes where the adults received welfare did not themselves wind up on the welfare rolls.

This dovetails with the dramatic gains black women have made in recent years in cracking corporate barriers. A 1986 survey by the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission revealed that, from 1980 to 1985, black women became corporate managers and officials faster than any other group.

Education: The black high school dropout rate declined to 12.6% in 1985 from 22.2% in 1970, according to the Census Bureau. And, at 1.1 million, the number of blacks in college in 1984 was a record.

Employment/Income: The percentage of blacks living in poverty actually dropped in 1986, for the third straight year, to 31.1%, the Census Bureau says. Further, from 1982 to 1986, black family income climbed 14%, outstripping the 10.2% gain by while families. And even though black unemployment remained disgracefully high--nearly double that of whites--a record 10.8 million blacks held jobs in 1986.

Advances by blacks in education and income were reflected in the business world. The traditional mom-and-pop stores and barber and beauty shops scorned by Frazier and other critics as pitiful examples of black enterprise were replaced in the 1980s by black-owned energy firms, auto dealers, manufacturers, banks, savings and loans and communications firms. The annual business survey by Black Enterprise magazine in June found that the top 100 black businesses in 1986 had a collective growth rate of 11.2% and total sales of $3.3 billion, both records.

Stable black businesses and experienced black owners and managers have had an impact on the attitudes and buying practices of corporate purchasers. Many business executives no longer regard dealing with minority vendors as charity cases or a sop to public relations. The National Minority Business Council, a New York-based trade association, noted that majority firms purchased $8.83 billion in goods and services from minority vendors in 1986, up from $6.6 billion in 1985. John F. Robinson, council president, said “it is not uncommon” for 15% to 20% of a company’s purchases to come from minority firms.

Coca-Cola typifies this. It awarded 35% of the construction contracts for work on its new Atlanta corporate headquarters to minority contractors, builders, architects, interior designers and landscaping companies.

The new black bourgeoisie now finds itself in the enviable position of possessing the economic muscle to make an impact politically and to aid the ghetto poor. Affluent blacks have funded scholarship programs, job and skill training centers, business development and community improvement programs nationwide.

They have been major bankrollers of the Jesse Jackson presidential campaign and have formed political action committees. Heated opposition from black business and congressional leaders forced the Reagan Administration to temporarily retreat from its plan to scuttle the Minority Business Development Agency last year.

Some black organizations are proposing even more ambitious and far-reaching economic plans, such as a National Capital Bank and a National Black Development Fund to provide venture capital to new black businesses and seed money for social programs. Bernard Anderson, formerly with the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School, even sees black business playing a bigger role in reducing black unemployment by creating career opportunities for young blacks and generating income for broader economic development in the inner city.

Black self-help prospects also have garnered the enthusiastic support of liberal civil rights organizations that once attacked self-help as a scheme by black conservatives to divert energy from civil rights and other social action goals. At last summer’s NAACP convention, Benjamin Hooks, NAACP executive director, told the audience: “Black America must do much of this work itself, for it is our future we must save.”

Black leaders know that conservative social policies and spiraling budget deficits pretty much guarantee that there will be no rush to put government back into the business of being a Great Society job and social service provider--no matter who takes office in 1989. Still, the emergence of the new black bourgeoisie with economic and political clout can be a strong force for change in the future. This is a fact that even Frazier would have to admit if he were writing today.