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Black and Latino Retail Workers Are More Likely to be Underemployed and Underpaid

“The striking persistence of racial inequities in employment is present in the retail industry and beyond, but these norms do not have to continue.”

The May jobs report from the Department of Labor is out, and while 280,000 jobs were added to the economy, 43% of all job gains were in the low wage sector. 

The overall unemployment rate is 5.5%, and the rate for African Americans and Latinos is still higher than the rate for whites, coming in at 10.2% and 6.7% respectively. The unemployment rate for whites is currently 4.7%. 

"We're at a really interesting and troubling point where student debt has become sort of normalized," Mark Huelsman, a senior policy analyst at the think tank Demos, told Mic. "Tuition used to be low enough and grant aid used to be high enough that total cost of attendance at higher university was manageable with a summer job."

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Vermont will allow voters to cast ballots the same day they register to vote, effective January 2017. It used to be that voters would need to register close to a week before casting a ballot, but that’s changing.

Republicans claim voter ID laws aren't racist, but numbers don't lie.

Sean McElwee, a researcher for progressive think tank Demos, compared measures of racist sentiments among white people in each of the 50 states (such as whether they believe blacks are trustworthy or intelligent) to dataon voting laws in each state, including when they were introduced and how strict they are.

Demos Vice President of Policy & Outreach Lenore Palladino issued the following statement on Vermont’s passage of Same-Day Registration:

"Demos applauds Vermont’s passage of Same-Day Registration (SDR), which will allow residents to register to vote and then cast a regular ballot in a one-stop process at every polling location. Every eligible American should have an equal opportunity to vote, and it should be free, fair and easily accessible. SDR is an important step to ensure this happens.

Voting Rights Groups Call on State to Fix Voter Registration at DMVs, or Face Litigation

Officially count Vermont as the latest state to usher in Same-Day Registration.

It's no secret the wealth gap between African American and White households is widening. However, the estimated median wealth between the two groups would jump a whopping 450 percent if African Americans owned homes at the same rates as Whites, according to a study released earlier this year by a New York City-based think tank.