The Race Gap: How U.S. systemic racism plays out in Black lives

[July 14, 2020]    By Travis Hartman, Samuel Hart, Jonnelle Marte and Howard Schneider
 
 (Reuters) - Inequality between white and Black Americans persists in almost every aspect of society and the economy. Such disadvantages have proven immune to decades of laws and policies meant to address them, leaving Black people with less education, less wealth, poorer health and shorter lifespans. Together, the disparities reflect what many have labeled systemic racism amid the mass protests that followed the killing of George Floyd, a Black man, by a white Minneapolis police officer in May.

Pedestrians walk past a large "Black Lives Matter" banner painted on a street near the Brooklyn borough hall in New York City, New York, U.S., June 26, 2020. REUTERS/Lucas Jackson

There has been progress in recent decades. But wide gaps — rooted in the legacy of slavery, segregation and discrimination — have endured or widened in the years since the civil rights victories of the 1960s. Born from the enslavement of Africans in British colonies since the early 1600s, American inequality plays out over the course of a lifetime. Reuters explores the impact on Black lives today in this interactive graphic: https://tmsnrt.rs/38VDcKJ

(Editing by Christine Chan and Brian Thevenot)

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