“I believe that the American descendants of enslaved people deserve reparations. Period. Just flat out deserve it,” says an Ohio politician.
A regular installment about race and money in America, from the authors of "The Black Dollar"
Good morning and welcome to our first newsletter of spring 2022. A few items before we move into today’s interview.
We write this newsletter to share some of our reporting for our forthcoming book, “The Black Dollar,” as we are compiling interviews, historic records and listening to stories across the country.
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Now onto this installment, which seems timely to share in Women’s History Month.
-Ebony and Louise
The Q&A.
We’ve been talking with Americans across the country about the wealth gap, with a lens on Black Americans. Ebony caught up with Nina Turner, who recently announced she’s running again for U.S. Congress.
Previously, Turner served as an Ohio State Senator, Cleveland City Council member and professor at Cuyahoga Community College, her alma mater. In 2020, she was a national co-chair for Sen. Bernie Sanders’ presidential campaign. She grew up in a poor family in Cleveland and has made economic justice one of her major platform issues.
Ebony: The wealth of Black families is less than 15 percent of what white families hold. Black Americans have the lowest homeownership rate - less than 50 percent - when compared to other racial groups. How do we fix the wealth gap?
Nina: I believe that the American descendants of enslaved people deserve reparations. Period. Just flat out deserve it. And that technically, if you were to ask me if I thought that this country could ever repay the debt, my answer is no. You cannot repay generations of African-Americans for what was done to our forefathers because they can't get that time back that they lost. We know at a very low point in this country's history, Black women were relegated to just doing domestic work. And Black men by and large were relegated to doing another type of domestic work. And that was all of the hard a- - s- - - that other white men did not want to do. So you limited generations of Black people, even beyond enslavement, from being able to live out their greatness and fulfill their ultimate potential. They'll never be able to pay us back, but I do want a down payment on it. I do want them to at least try because there are too many generations that were lost trying to fight for equality in this country. And unless you have economic justice, you really don't have a whole lot, right?
Ebony: Speaking of reparations, there is a bill pending right now that would benefit all living descendants of Black WWII veterans whose families did not receive housing and educational benefits though the G.I. bill, due to discrimination. Those benefits would have helped them build generational wealth. What do you think of this legislation?
Nina: Let's just go on and go all the way. Why are you picking and choosing? That divides the Black community. Now we're going to decide that only those descendants, people could point to black GIs (can receive benefits)?
Black people, even at the height of abuse in this country, have fought in every single war this country has ever had. The American Revolution. We were there. Crispus Attucks was there. We were there. We signed up to protect this country in ways that this country has never, ever wanted to protect us, even to this moment. And that is why the Black Lives Matter movement came into fruition. It really is a 21st century version of the Civil Rights Movement, and we keep finding ourselves back in these same spaces.
Ebony: Yes, Crispus Attucks, a Black man, was the first person killed in the Boston Massacre and the first American killed in the American Revolution. Did anyone in your family serve in the military?
Nina: My maternal grandfather, Occar Emerson, fought in World War II. Also, my paternal grandfather, Robert George Hudson, served in the Army during World War II.
Before that, my paternal great-great-great-great grandfather, Twistum Hudson fought in the Civil War when he was 17-years-old. We know this from ancestral research our family has on the Civil War record. We don’t know what happened to Hudson in the Civil War and later during his life. My cousin, the unofficial family genealogist, says he was a slave and was forced like thousands to fight for the South. My father wasn’t in the military, but my uncles Phillip and John Hudson served in the Vietnam War.
Ebony: That’s a long military history for your family. So, you could actually be someone who could receive reparations from that bill if it’s passed?
Nina: Yes, my family could potentially benefit, but I am still saying: that is not enough. Our existence as a people is strictly linked to the past, the present and the future. The things we as a people fight for are very much rooted in the past. We also have to be resolute about what we want in our lifetime, what our present looks like and then, we're building towards the future. To me, that is the liberation struggle of Black people. We are constantly in that cycle, whether we know it or not. And it's the past, it is the present and it is the future that drives us.
Ebony: That's a hard cycle to be in when you are trying to create generational wealth. Are you the first in your family to graduate from college?
Nina: I am a first-generation college graduate, and my brother, Theodore Hudson, followed suit. I am the oldest of seven siblings. My son became a second-generation college graduate.
Ebony: How hard was this accomplishment?
Nina: When I first went to Cuyahoga Community College in Cleveland, I dropped out because family circumstances prevented me from staying enrolled. When I returned years later, my G.P.A. was in the negatives because I left without formally withdrawing from my classes. Iris Williams was my counselor. She took me under her wing and wouldn't let me feel sorry for myself and encouraged me to create a plan. I made the Dean’s List every quarter after that. CCC is responsible for molding me into the leader I am today. I participated in student activities. Everything came full circle. After starting off as a lecturer, by the time I left for politics, I was a tenured professor at CCC.
Ebony: Some Black Americans have told Louise and me in our book reporting that the cost of higher education is forcing them into long-term debt, limiting their ability to create generational wealth. Black women owe 22 percent more on average than white women.
Nina: The President of the United States of America could with a stroke of a pen cancel student debt. So in terms of building wealth, that is another example of what can be done concretely to bring down the debt pressure in the African-American community. And thereby free more disposable income. Student debt cancellation would decrease the racial wealth gap for Black Americans from 12:1 to 5:1. Black women hold a disproportionate amount of student debt.
Ebony: Many companies made pledges to support the Black community after George Floyd’s murder, but it is challenging to track whether they followed through. What are your thoughts on this?
Nina: The (way the) return on investment is measured has to be changed because these are generational problems. You are not going to fix it in six months and 12 months. It's like planting a seed. You got to water it. Make sure you give it the right sunlight. Cultivate the soil. The fruit that the tree will bear will take years. And so until we have a metric that will recognize that very real reality, I think we're going to continue bumping our heads up against a brick wall. Maybe their intentions were good. Maybe they were just totally shocked by a public lynching in that way of what happened to George Floyd. And it made them say, “Oh my God, we must do something.”
Ebony: What would you do instead?
Nina: Just like they enslaved our behinds through deliberate means, they are going to have to rectify the damage that has been done to Black people generationally, deliberately by public policy. We just got to stand up at that podium and say, “This is what must be done, this will be done and there will be a carrot and stick on all levels of government to ensure that it is done.” If I were President of the United States of America, I would appoint somebody whose only job would be to do it. The fix must be as extreme as the tactics used to enslave us generation after generation. Look at the Great Recession in 2008. Black people lost 50 percent of their wealth. You know, we haven't even rectified that.
Ebony: Yes, we know the Great Recession had a profound impact on Black families. We saw unemployment rates highest among Black Americans - 16 percent - many lost their homes to foreclosures and saw nearly half their wealth disappear.
Nina: We must put forward as a community, knowing that we're not necessarily homogeneous in how to get there. The key point should be we want to build wealth, and so we have to be pushing policies and have a report card, if you will, a scorecard, especially on the federal and state levels of government that these are the things that we fully expect to be done for our people.
Ebony: Thank you, Nina. I appreciate your time.
We are interested in hearing from readers of this newsletter who have personal stories about losing their homes and jobs in the 2008 financial crisis or dealing with student loan debt. Reply to this newsletter to share your story.
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The Latest Highlights
Rejection high for Black refi mortgage applicants at WellsFargo: Bloomberg had an interesting analysis of federal mortgage data that has found only 47% of Black homeowners who completed a refinance application with Wells Fargo in 2020 were approved, compared with 72% of White homeowners. While Black applicants had lower approval rates than White ones at all major lenders, the data show, Wells Fargo had the biggest disparity and was alone in rejecting more Black homeowners than it accepted.
What’s the role of academia in creating equitable leaders?: Kerwin Charles, Dean of the Yale School of Management and professor of economics, said academic institutions should include experiences for students that create environments of listening and collaboration across racial lines in a recent interview with John Rice, CEO and founder of Management Leadership for Tomorrow. Two key drivers keep Black Americans from achieving economic equity — current policies and the long arm of race throughout history, he said. The policies, Charles said, have resulted in more Black Americans being incarcerated, which limits future job opportunities and economic mobility.
Black Americans and pandemic stock market gains: CNBC reports that Black Americans lack of participation in the stock market will likely widen the post-pandemic wealth gap. Only 34 percent of Black American households own equity investments, such as stocks, as compared with 61% of white families, according to the Federal Reserve Board’s most recent survey in 2019. The article states less than half of Black Americans have retirement savings accounts, with a typical balance of around $20,000, compared to 65% of white Americans, who have an average balance of $50,000.
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