Economic Opportunity
Monday, June 22, 2020
June 22, 2020
Rescue Black Business from the Pandemic
The
ever-expanding COVID-19 has just unearthed yet another racial disparity. Shockingly, 40% of the nation’s Black-owned
businesses may permanently close due to lack of customers, lack of federal
funding and lack of private reserves.
Many black-owned companies closed when they were determined not to be
“essential” from a government perspective.
They are not closing due to lack of talent, ability to serve customers
well, or from any form of neglect. Many Black-owned
firms are closing because they do not have the financial strength to weather
the worst economic and health calamity the U.S. has faced since the Great
Depression.
CBS News
reported today that “There were more than 1 million black-owned businesses in
the U.S. at the beginning of February, according to research from the
University of California at Santa Cruz, which drew from Census survey
estimates. By mid-April, 440,000 black business owners had shuttered their
company for good — a 41% plunge. By comparison, 17% of white-owned businesses
closed during the same period, the UC Santa Cruz research shows.”
While we are
still digesting the racial disparity in COVID-19 deaths and reeling from the
televised execution of George Floyd, we now must face the fact that one of the
true bright spots for African Americans is being erased. From 2018 to 2019, the number of firms owned
by African-American women grew faster than the overall growth rate for women
and for Black men, an annual increase of 50%.
Black women
start out with less income and less wealth that can be applied to creating a
new business. The long-standing gender
pay gap widens for the majority of racial and ethnic groups as women move up
the corporate ladder, though not to the same degree. The largest controlled pay
gap is for Black and African American women, with Black female executives
earning $0.62 for every dollar a white male executive earns.
When it comes
to wealth, the racial inequity is even worse.
According to the Brookings Institution, a “close examination of wealth
in the U.S. finds evidence of staggering racial disparities. At $171,000, the
net worth of a typical white family is nearly ten times greater than that of a
Black family ($17,150) in 2016. Gaps in wealth between Black and white
households reveal the effects of accumulated inequality and discrimination, as
well as differences in power and opportunity that can be traced back to this
nation’s inception. The Black-white wealth gap reflects a society that has not
and does not afford equality of opportunity to all its citizens.”
If the United
States and Corporate America are sincere about closing racial economic gaps,
here is a prescription:
1. Corporate CEOs should empower supplier
diversity departments to do business with highly qualified companies owned and
operated by Black women.
2. The Small Business Administration (SBA)
should increase the size of its Economic Injury Disaster Loan advance from
$10,000 to $100,000.
3. Small Business Development Centers
(SBDCs) should be empowered to actively seek out Black-owned businesses to make
sure they are aware of the EIDL program and provide application assistance and
support. There are 112 SBDCs scattered across the nation that, according to the
SBA website, “make special efforts to reach minority members of socially and
economically disadvantaged groups, veterans, women and the disabled.”
4. Given the compelling interest that the
nation has in preserving these businesses, and the clear evidence that there is
disparate impact on Black people, the Congress should issue another round of
PPP loans specifically aimed at under-served Black urban neighborhoods and
rural communities.
5. Given our personal responsibility to our
own community, Black people (and all people of good will) should make it a
priority to shop with Black-owned companies.
While it may be
true that most Black-owned businesses do not employ hundreds of people, most of
them do provide a relatively stable source of income for the proprietors, their
families and employees. If 40% of them
fail to survive, there will inevitably be increased demand for services such as
SNAP (food stamps), Medicaid and other support programs. Let’s do the smart thing – come together as a
nation and throw a safety net to thousands of American companies capable of
providing great service during these difficult and unprecedented times.
NBC Interviews Rayshard Brooks Months Before Atlanta Police Kill Him
https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/rayshard-brooks-he-was-killed-police-said-justice-system-sees-n1231411
By Ben Kesslen
Rayshard Brooks talked about criminal justice in the U.S. in a February interview, saying he wished the system didn't view us as if "we are animals."
Months later, Brooks, a 27-year-old Black man and father to four, was killed by police in the parking lot of a Wendy's in Atlanta.
The fatal shooting happened June 12, after two officers responded to a 911 call reporting that a man who appeared intoxicated was sleeping in his car in the restaurant's drive-through.
The officer who fired the fatal shots, Garrett Rolfe, was fired from his job and charged with felony murder among 11 counts total on Wednesday. The second officer, Devin Brosnan, was placed on administrative leave and is a cooperating witness for the state. He faces three charges, including aggravated assault and violation of oath.
Brooks' interview in February 2019 was conducted by Reconnect as part of a project about individuals on probation or parole.
"Some people, they get a tap on the wrist" from authorities, Brooks said about inequities in the criminal justice system. "But some people don’t."
Brooks also talked about the struggle to get back on your feet when you have a criminal record, and the emotional toll of being caught up in the system.
"You get treated like an animal," he said. "Some of the system could look at us as individuals; we do have lives, you know."
"I'm trying, I'm not the type of person to give up. I'm going to keep going till I make it to where I want to be," he said.
Brooks said being judged for a criminal record and denied employment is a "hard feeling to stomach" when he was just trying to support his family.
"There could be a way to erase some of these things," he said, referencing records that follow people and job applications that ask prospective employees if they've ever been arrested or incarcerated.
"It breaks your heart," Brooks said. "That puts us down."
Monday, June 8, 2020
Changing the World
June 2, 2020
Johnnetta
Betsch Cole, Ph.D. and Janice L. Mathis, Esq.
George Floyd’s
six-year-old daughter Gianna looked on quizzically while her mother gave a heart
wrenching description of what the death of her father would mean throughout the
child’s life. Roxie Washington, Gianna’s
mother, described the future. He won’t
be there to soothe hurts, to answer hard questions, to host the graduation
party or the wedding reception. The
scene was all the more painful because Mr. Floyd did nothing sufficient to
deprive him of the rights and responsibilities of fatherhood, which Ms.
Washington said he relished. Let’s say
he was in possession of a counterfeit bill – the punishment for that crime is
not execution without a trial.
Our nation and
indeed the world are gripped by the story of Houston native George Floyd, who
moved to Minneapolis looking for better job opportunities. Piled on top of the
pandemic, 40,000,000 people unemployed, Black people dying at three times the
rate of White people, the murder of Breonna Taylor, a 26-year-old African
American woman in her own home and the hunting down of Ahmaud Arbery, the
execution of George Floyd lit a keg of powder that was overdue to explode.
As a women’s
organization, NCNW and our allies are particularly sickened and saddened by the
growing number of Black women who lose their lives in police custody. Breonna Taylor was killed in her own home,
Tiara Thomas was killed by the police officer who fathered three of her
children, Sandra Bland is alleged to have hung herself after being arrested on
a traffic charge, Natasha McKenna, who
had schizophrenia, was killed with a stun gun when she “refused to
comply.” Although no unarmed Black
person is exempt from excessive use of force, it is shameful that the death of
an unarmed Black woman just does not receive the same attention from the
public, the police or the media.
Eight days of
global protests have so far proven insufficient to exhaust the rage so many of
us are feeling.. global protests haveso And so far, the evidence suggests that
rage is the right response. The dueling
autopsy reports do nothing to dispel the horror of Derrick Chauvin’s knee and
body weight pressed onto George Floyd’s neck, but the preliminary reports
confirm the commonsense conclusion that the cause of his death was
homicide.
Peaceful
protests from New York to San Francisco were marred by looting and
intentionally set fires, threatening to detract attention from the issue at the
core of our pain – race based bias against African Americans by law enforcement
and in virtually every other human endeavor. It is heartening to see veteran
civil rights activists, basketball stars and peaceful protestors calling out
looters with phrases like, “that’s not why we are here.”
Now that
Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison has taken over the prosecution, the
charges against Chauvin have been upgraded to 2nd degree murder (as opposed to
the awkwardly conceived 3rd
degree charge that requires no intent.)
And the other three officers “complicit” in Floyd’s death are under
arrest and criminally charged with aiding and abetting murder.
Meanwhile, the
Minneapolis Police Department will undergo an investigation of any patterns and
practices of abuse. Had we not scrapped
President Obama’s 21st Century Policing Policy, George Floyd might still be
alive. Perhaps if Minneapolis had been
subject to a rigorous pattern or practice investigation, no officer would have dared to
brutalize Mr. Floyd. Hindsight is
2020.
Despite the
rage and pain this incident has caused, we must look forward. It is good to read the many statements being
published by corporate, and non-profit organizations that are declaring that
Black lives matter. And it is good to see Black and White people championing the
same cause, shoulder to shoulder. But as
we know so well, these declarations and marching together in protest must be
reinforced with sustained actions that call for the kinds of legal, policy and
everyday changes in people’s behavior that will genuinely attack the root
causes of systemic racism.
We are
cautiously optimistic that finally, our nation might begin not only to speak
the words but also to engage in the countless actions that might finally
exorcise the devil of racism that has eaten at the soul of America from before
its inception. It is good to hear calls
for the “good people” to stand up and speak out. It was good to see clergy, including Bishop
Mariann Budde say. “we need moral leadership.”
It is good to see chiefs of police on bended knee next to
protestors. (We owe Colin Kaepernick an
apology. We should all have been taking
a knee with him.) It will be far better if we take that outrage to the ballot
box and insist on the changes we have needed and deserved for so long.
We must insist
that the courts, the Congress and the state legislatures of our great nation
curtail qualified immunity, a legal theory that forms the thick blanket of
legal protection that shields government
officials from prosecution for their criminal actions. We must hear women’s
voices with the same clarity and urgency that we hear men. We must also insist that prospective police
officers undergo psychological evaluation to weed out unreconstructed racists
before they can be sworn onto any force.
And there must be implicit bias training for those who are unconscious
that they are the beneficiaries of white privilege. There must be an accurate national data base
of excessive force complaints so that no police department inadvertently hires
a candidate against whom multiple complaints of brutality have been
proven. Officers who know about illegal
deprivation of civil and human rights must be encouraged to freely report what
they see and what they know about fellow officers, without fear of
reprisal. And there must be truly
independent citizen review committees empowered to protect the communities they
live in. We are not naïve. Assuring justice in criminal investigations
and prosecutions is a gargantuan task. But if we persevere and if we put human
rights above political expediency and tribalism, love above hate, we may one
day join with Gianna in saying that her daddy did not die in vain, for he truly
changed the world.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)