Racial divides still run deep in the United States. The Pew Research Center has released a new report called “ King’s Dream Remains an Elusive Goal; Many Americans See Racial Disparities.” The study’s findings show that although improvements have been made, major gaps remain in racial equality.
Pew’s research finds 45 percent of Americans think the country has made a lot of progress toward racial equality, but half of Americans think the U.S. still has a long way to go in reaching equal rights. This opinion differs along party lines; only 35 percent of Republicans believe a lot still needs to be done compared with 63 percent of Democrats.
Some of the other key findings show where racial divisions have improved, worsened, or remained the same among African-Americans and whites. Only about 26 percent of African-Americans say that circumstances for black people are better now than 5 years ago. This has dropped from 2009 when a Pew survey showed 39 percent of people saw the situation for black people better than 5 years ago.
There was a spike between 2007 and 2009 when whites and blacks reported feeling more positive about the progress of African-Americans. Pew concludes this may be attributed to the election of President Barack Obama
All four ethnic groups in the survey — whites, blacks, Asians and Hispanics — said that overall, racial groups get along. High school graduation rates have risen for all groups, but the biggest gains have been for African-Americans and Hispanics. Hispanic students still remain behind other minorities in high school graduation. The income gap between whites and blacks and whites and Hispanics has broadened over the past 30 to 40 years.
You can explore Pew’s analysis and results of a recent survey on racial equality with interactive graphs and a slideshow.
