Frontline Folk

You’ve seen the headlines:

“Black People are disproportionately Dying from Coronavirus.” “Racial inequalities in COVID-19—the impact on black Communities.” “Black Communities account for disproportionate number of COVID deaths.” “COVID-19 disproportionately claiming Black Lives.” “Evidence mounts on the disproportionate effect of COVID-19 on ethnic minorities.” “COVID-19 is crushing Black Communities...”

We may not agree on much. But on this there is widespread concurrence: Blacks are taking a heavy lick from COVID and the adjectives used to describe the toll on black lives are particularly evocative. Not just disproportionate but crushed, slammed, pummeled, hammered, and clocked. There is a growing consensus that Blacks are bearing the brunt.

But this consensus doesn’t carry over into an analysis of why it is that COVID is lowering the boom on Black folk. As I mentioned in a previous blog, there is a strong tendency to place the blame and therefore the responsibility on the shoulders of Black people. There is an inclination, and a strong one, to view the disproportionate burden born by Blacks as evidence of personal irresponsibility. This inclination to see Blacks as personally irresponsible, as failing but needing to “step up” is a view shared by many pundits, politicians, and pastors. Thus, for instance, Representative Marc Veasey (Fort Worth, Texas) accuses Blacks of being indifferent to the dangers of COVID, of having adopted a “lackadaisical approach to social distance.” You also catch a particularly pungent whiff of this in Tyler Perry’s plea to Black folks: “Please, please, please, I beg you to take this seriously.”

Again, the problem is that there is absolutely no evidence—NONE—that comes even close to substantiating the claim that Blacks, collectively, are more “lackadaisical” than other group.

In fact, the evidence suggests that Black folk be taking COVID more seriously than other racial or ethnic group. Remember, that Pew study I mentioned in a previous blog? You know, the survey that reported that 46% of Black respondents, compared to 21% of Whites, consider COVID a major threat to their personal threat. Remember that one? What I didn’t tell you is that these results are from interviews conducted between March 14th-16th. In other words, we took COVID seriously from jump street. From the start. From the get-go! And given the increasing havoc that COVID has wreaked since then, it’s reasonable to assume that even greater percentages recognize the dangers of this disease. If anything, the PEW survey suggest that it just might be Whites who are especially in need of data drops to convince them that this COVID stuff is damn serious. Perhaps its Whites, not Blacks, who need to be targeted in all these “step up and follow the guidelines” campaigns and speeches. I’m still waiting for the politician, the pundit, and the preacher who bellows out to White folk, “Yawl need to start acting more like Negroes and take this stuff seriously.” But I ain’t going to hold my breath on this one. For in the public’s imagination it’s always Black folk who need fixing. That we could ever be a standard toward which others should aspire is a thought that leaves most Whites, and some Blacks, completely aghast.

A RACIALLY AND GENDERED CODED LABOR MARKET

Rather than pushing the tired claim that Blacks are data duds, and that this is driving racial disparities in COVID contraction and death rates, we’d be much better served by fashioning responses that center the lives and experience of Black workers. We’d be much better off by paying sufficient attention to the ways in which race and capitalism has interacted to generate a labor market that is deeply racially and gendered coded. We’d be much better off by interrogating the extent to which Blacks are disproportionately represented in the very gigs whose incumbents are at heightened risk of exposure to COVID.

By now, we’ve all heard the term “essential workers,” the group of workers whose laboring is considered indispensable to keeping the machine humming somewhat during such events as national emergencies and pandemics. Or, as recent Brookings reports puts it, those industries and occupations “whose functions are critical to public health, safety, and economic and national security.”

Economist Francine Blau and her colleagues estimate that about 70% of the entire workforce falls into the category of “essential workers.” The thing about “essential workers” is that while even some of them can —and do—work from home, others must show up in person to perform their duties. Dubbed “Frontline” workers and we’re all intimately familiar with them: the grocery store cashier checking us out, the janitor who clean up behind our mess, the agricultural worker laboring under adverse conditions, the bus driver who gets us to where we need go, the postal worker delivering our packages, the health care worker tending to our weary bodies, and so on. It’s this subset of “essential workers”—Frontline Folk—who are particularly vulnerable to catching a case of COVID.

The historical and contemporary manifestations of racism have resulted in Blacks being disproportionately represented amongst what I call the “Frontline Folk.” A recent study by the Center for Economic and Policy Research finds that while we’re 11.9% of all workers, Blacks are 17% of Frontline Folk. What’s more, we’re:

• 26% of public transit workers

• 18.2% of trucking, warehouse, and postal workers

• 12.6% of building cleaning services

• 17.5% of health care workers

And:

• 19.3% of childcare and social service workers.

Just to be clear: Compared to our representation amongst all workers (11.9%), we’re overrepresented amongst Frontline Folk, with that overrepresentation being particularly pronounced within certain frontline occupations.

Significantly, 64% of Frontline Folk are women, 23% have incomes that place them at least 200% below the Federal poverty guidelines, 36% have a minor child in the household, and 16% also have a senior residing with them.

It’s our over representation amongst Frontline Folk that’s undoubtedly one of the causes contributing to racial disparities in COVID contraction and death rates. Being on the frontline can be both dangerous and deadly.

And if we believe that Black Lives Matter then, at the very least, we ought to be envisioning ways in which we can contribute to the sustenance of a political resistance that centers the lives and experiences of Frontline Folk.

Catch you on the rebound,

Doc Greene