ProPublica reports on public school students who are being left behind by the shift to remote learning, following the family of a middle-school student in Baltimore facing multiple moves, lack of Internet access and educational support, and constantly shifting school policies: “In Baltimore, where the midsummer rise in cases had ebbed, some of the city’s elite private schools were already open, while others were preparing to do so. They had hired extra teachers to shrink class sizes, set up tents for outdoor instruction and installed expensive audio-visual systems in classrooms to allow teachers to simultaneously teach students in class and at home, for additional spacing. Many parents around the country were dubious about young kids sitting through hours of online instruction and were removing them from the public school system: In Los Angeles, kindergarten enrollment was down by about 14%; in Chapel Hill, North Carolina, by 17%. Jon Hale, a professor of education at the University of Illinois, worried about the flight of middle- and upper-class students. “Anytime they see the system as unstable and they pull out of it, it has a lasting effect,” he said. “In this system, the dollars follow the student, and the consequences could be tragic. It will decimate the system for those who rely on it.” There has always been a gulf between public education and private. But the new disparity is stark: in many cities, children in private schools are going to school, and children in public schools are not. (Among such places is Prince Edward County.) A nationwide survey by the education news network Chalkbeat and The Associated Press found that roughly half of white students had the option of in-person instruction, while only about a quarter of Black and Hispanic students did. After a summer of renewed attention on the disparities facing Black people, millions of Black children would not be getting in-person education.”
The New York Times reports on the “collapse” of the Minneapolis City Council’s plan to dismantle the city’s police department: “In interviews this month, about two dozen elected officials, protesters and community leaders described how the City Council members’ pledge to “end policing as we know it” — a mantra to meet the city’s pain — became a case study in how quickly political winds can shift, and what happens when idealistic efforts at structural change meet the legislative process and public opposition. The pledge is now no closer to becoming policy, with fewer vocal champions than ever. It has been rejected by the city’s mayor, a plurality of residents in recent public opinion polls, and an increasing number of community groups. Taking its place have been the types of incremental reforms that the city’s progressive politicians had denounced.”
The Washington Post reports on inequitable employment losses in the wake of COVID-19: “Job losses from the pandemic overwhelmingly affected low-wage, minority workers most. Seven months into the recovery, Black women, Black men and mothers of school-age children are taking the longest time to regain their employment… No other recession in modern history has so pummeled society’s most vulnerable. The Great Recession of 2008 and 2009 caused similar job losses across the income spectrum, as Wall Street bankers and other white-collar workers were handed pink slips alongside factory and restaurant workers. The 2001 recession was more unequal than the Great Recession: After the 9/11 terrorist attacks, travel and tourism jobs vanished and low-wage employment fell 7 percent below the previous year’s level, while high earners remained largely unscathed. Yet, even that inequality is a blip compared with what the coronavirus inflicted on low-wage workers this year… At the height of the coronavirus crisis, low-wage jobs were lost at about eight times the rate of high-wage ones, The Post found. The devastation was deepest among the lowest-paid, but middle-class jobs were not spared. A clear trend emerged: The less workers earned at their job, the more likely they were to lose it as businesses across the country closed… What ties all of the hardest-hit groups together ― low-wage workers, Black workers, Hispanic men, those without college degrees and mothers with school-age children ― is that they are concentrated in hotels, restaurants and other hospitality jobs… Black women are facing the largest barriers to returning to work, data shows, and have recovered only 34 percent of jobs lost in the early months of the pandemic. They are among the most likely to work in low-paying service-sector jobs, which have been slow to rebound at a time when it is still a major health risk to be around others. Nearly 30 percent of Black women work in services, compared with only a fifth of White women. Blacks also often face discrimination in the hiring process, research from Texas A&M University and elsewhere has shown. It took until 2018 for Black women’s employment to recover from the Great Recession. Now almost all of those hard-won gains have been erased.”
The Bureau of Labor Statistics found that government employment continues to fall, especially in education, and that 845,000 women have dropped out of the labor force over the past month, compared to 216,000 men, pointing at a childcare crunch that threatens to set back women’s gains in the workplace, one of many ways the pandemic is having a disproportionate effect on women’s rights and participation in society around the world: “Working women are facing brutally hard choices about whether to stay home if they haven’t already been laid off. And the effect may be particularly severe in countries like the United States, where the pandemic is compounding inequalities that women already faced as a result of the lack of guaranteed paid maternity leave and affordable child care. “The question,” said Dr. Olivetti, who studies gender inequality, “is how far back do we go?” … Women already held more precarious positions in the work force — working fewer hours, for less money, with shorter tenures and in lower-ranking jobs than men. The loss of child care limited many working mothers’ hours and availability even further, meaning they were often the first to be selected for layoffs and unpaid leave, the report concluded. And it noted that many families appear to be deciding that if they need one parent to give up a job and prioritize child care, it should be the lower-paid parent — usually the mother.” The Washington Post also reported on how the pandemic is affecting access to abortion and reproductive healthcare: “Across the globe, the pandemic has made it harder for women and girls to access reproductive services, as clinics close and barriers to medical care rise. The United Nations warned that millions of unintended pregnancies could result, with some 47 million women potentially cut off from modern contraception.” And the Guardian reported that up to 2.5 million more girls around the world are at risk of being forced into child marriage over the next five years as a result of the impact of Covid-19, and that spikes in child labor and child trafficking are already being observed: “The report warns of 2020 being a year of “irreversible setbacks and lost progress” for girls. Around the world, school closures have interrupted the education of 1.6 billion children, and Save the Children estimates that 10 million children, mostly girls, will never return to school… The report also predicts that a million more girls under 18 could fall pregnant this year, putting lives at risk with childbirth still the leading cause of death among 15- to 19-year-olds.”
The LA Times reports that, “with Gov. Gavin Newsom’s signature, California became the first state government in the country on Wednesday to adopt a law to study and develop proposals for potential reparations to descendants of enslaved people and those impacted by slavery… The new law creates a task force to recommend appropriate remedies to the state Legislature and determine who should be eligible to receive compensation, which advocates hope will become a model in a country where movements to make amends for centuries of slavery have failed to gain traction at the federal level. “California has come to terms with many of its issues, but it has yet to come to terms with its role in slavery,” said Assemblywoman Shirley Weber (D-San Diego), the author of AB 3121. “We’re talking about really addressing the issues of justice and fairness in this country that we have to address.”
The Trace reports on a Pennsylvania court ruling from the end of September that found the Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act unconstitutional, “quash[ing] an attempt by the Illinois-based gun manufacturer Springfield Armory to dismiss a suit brought by the family of a Pennsylvania teenager killed with one of its guns. If the ruling stands, no gun company will be able to use the Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act, or PLCAA, to dismiss a lawsuit in the state of Pennsylvania. But the implications are potentially far greater. If the decision survives appeal at the state level, it is likely to catch the attention of the U.S. Supreme Court. A ruling against PLCAA at the federal level would provoke the gun industry’s worst fears, exposing companies to the kinds of product-liability suits that forced sweeping reforms in the pharmaceutical, tobacco, and automotive industries.”