I keep waiting for that study that suggests those of us who worry about lingering discrimination and its persistently corrosive effects on the black community are about to run out of exhibits.

But, even in these latter days, there is no dearth of material that shows significant differences in the way black Americans and the rest of the citizenry are living. Giving the wealth of evidence, you’ve got to believe that either something sinister is afoot or that we are simply jinxed.

The case for bad luck might be tenable were it not for the fact that the misfortune routinely stems not from bad aptitude on our part but from bad attitudes on the part of others. It has never been that we are inferior or undeserving, but that people with power choose –- yes, choose -– to treat us as if we were. Not all of us nor all of them, for sure. But too many on both counts. Don’t blame it on karma.

Here is one of the latest blows: A study by two Princeton professors found that white male ex-convicts in New York City are three times more likely to get entry-level jobs than are black men with prison records.

But, wait; it gets worse. The researchers also found that white ex-cons are more likely to get hired than are black men who have never been in trouble with the law. According to the study, when 10 white men without records applied for a job and got a callback or a job offer, seven white men with prison records did too.  But when 10 black men without records got a second look, only three ex-cons scored.

Is that deep enough for you?

Mind you, these findings were not mined in Oklahoma City, but New York City -- the nation’s most proudly cosmopolitan locale. That citadel of enlightenment, culture, liberalism and diversity. Supposedly the Big Apple, not the Big Rotten Apple.

We all recognize the national fondness for scapegoating the South for racism and discrimination, as if that despicable business is indigenous to one region or can be confined there. And we well know what a lie that is, having run into plenty of northern devils in our time.

Still, how wrenching it is to discover that even in that place where we claim to be our most harmonious, a white convicted criminal has a better lot than a black man who has kept his nose clean.

Here is where the conservative argument about “personal responsibility” falls flat on its face. Try explaining to the black “clean” applicant that “if you work hard and play by the rules,” you can expect fair treatment when he can’t get a job as readily as a white guy with a felony conviction on his resume.

Of course no one said life was fair. But it could damn sure be fairer than this.

Besides, you can’t blame life or nature or destiny for predicaments like this. The habits of racism are made and sustained by man. Some are subtle, some are stark, some do their dirty work quickly, some take years to unfold. All, however, are deadly to human ambition, hope and faith.

To be sure, this is not your grandmother’s America. On the racial front, there has been demonstrable, appreciable progress. But not yet success.

With this new revelation, the Princeton researchers have put another log on the fire of righteous black indignation.