Where U.S. Unemployment Is Still Sky-High: Indian Reservations
The town of Wanblee in the Pine Ridge reservation.
Photographer: Q. Sakamaki/Redux
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While U.S. unemployment is the lowest since 2000, it’s a different story in American Indian areas, where jobless rates still echo recession-era levels in the rest of the country.
Of 27 counties with a majority American Indian or Alaska Native population, about two-thirds had unemployment rates last year above the national level, with nine at 10 percent or higher. That compares with the national jobless rate of 4.1 percent in February.