2007-11-12-皮尤-Blacks_See_Growing_Values_Gap_Between_Poor_and_Middle_Class_91页_425kb

Summary of "Optimism About Black Progress Declines"

I. Overview

• Black optimism about progress has declined significantly compared to 1986, with only 44% expecting life to improve in the future, down from 57%. Four-in-ten feel things are unchanged, while nearly a third believe the situation is worse.
• Large racial gaps exist in perceptions: While about 55% of both Hispanics and Whites see things as better, Hispanics and older Black adults are slightly more optimistic, but demographic divides among blacks suggest pessimism is stronger among younger, less educated blacks.
• Views on Black-white values convergence are divided: 54% of all adults believe the values of whites and blacks are becoming more similar; this is highest among whites (72%) and lowest among blacks (54%).

II. Black Progress and Future Viability

• Black median household income has remained around 61% of white income for over decade; however, perceptions of the gap are between 34% (Hispanics) and 67% (whites) with those believing it grew has nearly doubled since 1986.
• About half of all blacks see a decline in shared values between the poor and middle-class, with 61% believing they've diverged over the past decade; this trend is especially pronounced among better educated blacks.
  -Affirmative Action: Most blacks (89%) support programs to help blacks, but fewer (78%) favor giving preferences if explicitly mentioned. When the word "preferences" was included, support dropped to 75% and remained the lowest among whites who opposed it at 52%.

III. Discrimination and Affirmative Action

• Black confidence in police drops significantly: Only 55% express confidence (up 6 percentage points from 1995 survey), with roughly one-third skeptical they enforce law fairly or are non-biased.
• Most blacks (75%) believe the death penalty is harsh and wrongly applied (up from 64% in 1995), while similar opinions among whites (57%) and Hispanics (37%) show significantly less harshness views.
• Majorities among blacks and Hispanics believe immigrants should not be the main reason for lack of black progress (87% of blacks blame personal factors); however, earlier civil rights sentiment saw black opinion favoring discrimination (68% in 1969).

IV. Popular Culture

• Hip hop music draws unanimously negative reviews from all respondents; 62% of blacks, 71% of blacks, and 59% of whites or Hispanics say rap and hip hop have a bad influence.
• Concern about negative hip hop effects peaks among first generation immigrants and higher-income blacks; bad language is the leading cited reason; women are more likely than men to believe rap and hip hop have a negative impact.

V. Criminal justice System

• Trust in police fairness is low among blacks (38%), falling further behind white confidence (74%). Young blacks (16%) show the fewest high-confidence ratings on police impartiality; overall police trust grew by 3 percentage points from 1995.
• Two-thirds of whites and blacks believe the death penalty is fairly applied, but blacks reject this by an overwhelming margin (64% think it's unfairly administered) giving support for capital punishment largely among white respondents (57%).

VI. Race and Race Relations

• Inter-group relations are mostly positive in spirit; but broad gaps remain between blacks and their own experiences with whites. Converging views exist among all races about discrimination as a chronic societal problem; blacks see greater value divides within their community.
• Blacks express considerably more negative views about media portrayals than other groups; half consider TV representation worse now than a decade ago; 48% of blacks say societal images hurt the black image.

VII. Leadership and Politics

• Like 1986 and earlier, blacks are overwhelming Democrats (65%-5%), but margin declined slightly. Voting patterns are influenced by education and income, but black political confidence in national figures, church leaders, and the NAACP has fallen precipitously since 1983.
• Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama scores high among blacks and non-Hispanic whites (52% largely favorable); however, slightly more than four-in-ten (39%) believe his race would hurt him. Blacks who know him better or are of higher educational and economic status
  are less likely to see race as a liability.

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Disclaimer: This summary is extracted from the complete survey analysis designed to reduce factors like ordering or survey effects that complicate interpretation of individual data points. Even the summary may be more digestible than the full report, especially for readers without survey research expertise.