New data from the Williams Institute at the University of California – Los Angeles reveals there are more than one million LGBT African-Americans currently living in the United States.
Using data from the 2010 U.S. Census, researchers uncovered several important findings about the LGBT African-American community. For example, nearly 84,000 LGBT African-Americans live in same-sex households – 34% of which are raising children. Many of these families are led by women and reside in the south. LGBT African-Americans are less likely to be employed, less likely to have a college degree, and less likely to have health insurance when compared to their heterosexual counterparts.
"LGBT African-American parents and their children [experience] significant economic disadvantage and many live in states without LGBT anti-discrimination laws or marriage equality," co-author Angeliki Kastanis told the Huffington Post. "Establishing these important legal protections could really help these families."
HRC works nationally to enhance the lives of LGBT people through our efforts on marriage equality, workplace non-discrimination, and capacity-building events like the HBCU Leadership and Career Summit. Now entering its twelfth year, the HBCU Summit equips LGBT African-American students with the skills they need to effect change on historically black colleges and universities.
To learn more about the HBCU Summit, please visit www.hrc.org/hbcu.