The number: 20% — Black Americans who say things are better than five years ago

A Pew survey finds black Americans less upbeat about the state of black progress now than at any time since 1983; looking backward, just one in five blacks say things are better for blacks now than they were five years ago. Back in 1969, fully 70% of blacks said that as a group their situation had improved over the preceding five years. Whites remain more positive in their assessment. While they, too, have grown much less sanguine about black progress, they are nearly twice as likely as blacks (37%) to see black gains in the past five years.