a severe toll on families all across america, but one group has been hit especially hard. overall the jobless rate is 9.2% in this country for the past 29 straight months, but among african-americans it is now just over 16%, that is nearly one in six, double the rate for whites. senior national correspondent john roberts is live in atlanta with a look at this. john? >> reporter: you know, jon, it's a particularly tragic situation driven home by the report this week that for all those african-americans who have spent the last three decades trying to climb the click ladder, this recession has virtually wiped out those gains. you pointed to an up employment rate of -- unemployment rate of slightly more than 16% nationally. it's particularly bad in charlotte, north carolina, a place where one in five -- 20% of african-americans -- are out of work. >> my last day was july 29, 2009, i've been out of work two years.