Montreal is still a long way from racial equality, according to a recent study conducted by several professors at McGill’s School of Social Work. The comprehensive survey of the city’s black demographics found that black Montrealers make less money and are less likely to be employed than non-blacks.
On average, the unemployment rate for black Montrealers is 10.9 per cent, as opposed to 4 per cent for non-blacks. The poverty rate for blacks, at 39.2 per cent, is nearly twice as high as the rate for non-blacks, at 20.2 per cent.
The study also found that black Montrealers who have earned graduate degrees earn significantly less than non-blacks with similar qualifications. The average income for all black Montrealers is one-third less that the city’s average.
Though the study doesn’t draw explicit connections between inequality and racism, James Torczyner, a McGill professor of social work who is the study’s lead author, said that it was possible to read such links into the data.
“The census data doesn’t ask questions about attitudes, so I can’t say it’s because of racism in Canada,” Torczyner said. “But members of the black community are saying that. They’re the ones who have experienced the data in their daily lives.”
Clarence Bayne, a professor of business at Concordia University who has also conducted research on the subject, said that both Torczyner’s numbers and those of other researchers tell a story of “clear, persistent, and almost brutal discrimination by the market against blacks and visible minorities.”
Other factors may contribute to the city’s racial inequality, however. About 60 per cent of black Montrealers are immigrants. In addition, the black community is more fragmented in Montreal, because members often have different heritages or speak different languages.
“Because of the way Montreal is, you live in a neighbourhood where your language is spoken,” Torczyner said. “You’ll find French-speaking blacks in the east end and English-speaking blacks on the west end, so it divides it by geography as well as by language.”
According to Torczyner, this fragmentation may prevent the black community from addressing its pressing unemployment and income problems.
“You take [the fragmentation], and you take a community that is growing so rapidly and the resources aren’t, [and] you end up with a proliferation of community groups in the black community with diminished funds,” Torczyner said.
In the short term, Torczyner said that he hopes he can help keep the city focussed on the issue.
“I would be very pleased if we could create a small organization led by members of the black community to be able to do what I’ve done now, and to be able to bring data to the community and to galvanize an agenda and to organize a strategy,” he said.
Tolu Adeniyi, one of Torczyner’s master’s students, called the study’s findings “shocking.” Although she might face an uphill battle as a black person with a graduate degree, Adeniyi said she remains optimistic.
“It is discouraging, but at the same time, I’m not going to let it stop me,” she said.
