Black Americans want reparations to slavers' descendants: USA Today

NEW YORK, Sept. 17 (Xinhua) -- Up to 77 percent of Black Americans said the descendants of people enslaved in U.S. history should be repaid in some way, reported U.S. media outlet USA Today this week, citing a recent survey by Pew Research Center.

However, most of the interviewees don't think the Blacks will get the reparation though the goal has been long sought by the ethnic group and some U.S. officials, said the report.

"Overall, Black adults are pessimistic about the likelihood of reparations, but a large majority say the U.S. federal government should have all or most of the responsibility for repayment," the Pew Research Center said in its survey.

About 45 percent of Black people in the United States said equality is not likely to happen. In addition, nearly 9 in 10 Black adults want to see aspects of the courts and other parts of the criminal justice system reformed.

According to another report by Amsterdam News, a Black newspaper based in New York City, Black Americans remain vastly overrepresented in the prison population across the United States.

Citing a report by The Sentencing Project, the newspaper said Black Americans represented 14 percent of the total U.S. population, 33 percent of the total prison population, and 46 percent of the prison population who had already served at least 10 years.

"The over-representation of Black Americans among the prison population serving lengthy sentences stems in part from racial disparities in serious criminal offending," Nazgol Ghandnoosh, a senior research analyst at The Sentencing Project and co-author of the new report, was quoted as saying.