wealthfare

Billie Holiday penned the lines,

,

Them that's got shall get,

Them that's not shall lose.

So the Bible says,

And it's still news.

Mama may have.

Papa may have.

But God bless the child that's got his own.

[Holiday 1941]


...People with assets tend to do well in this world, and are even sometimes seen as virtuous, while people without assets do not do well... Yet the idea of asset accumulation has hardly been considered in welfare policy for the poor.

—Assets and the Poor: A New American Welfare Policy, Michael Sherraden (1991)






The enormous racial wealth gap perpetuates racial inequality in the United States. Racial inequality appears intransigent because the way families use wealth transmits advantages from generation to generation. Furthermore, the twenty-first century marks the beginning of a new racial dilemma for the United States: Family wealth and inheritance cancels gains in classrooms, workplaces, and paychecks, worsening racial inequality. I see no means of seriously moving toward racial equality without positive asset policies to address the racial wealth gap...

Since our inception as a nation, our priorities have been clear. We have provided some groups opportunities to homestead, own property and homes, get an education, and earn a livelihood, but for centuries these policies, by intent and implementation, virtually excluded Native Americans and minority groups. The government's wealth budget has a long history of serving as a core wealth-building system for some while denying others the same chances. And yet millions upon millions of Americans benefited, and continue to benefit...

—The Hidden Cost of Being African American: How Wealth Perpetuates Inequality (2004) / Toxic Inequality (2017), Thomas M. Shapiro





///

I keep my head high

I got my wings to carry me

I don't know freedom

I want my dreams to rescue me

///

I like to write alone, be in my zone

Think back to Forest Hills, no perfect home

But the only thing like home I've ever known

Until they snatched it from my mama

And foreclosed her on the loan

I'm so sorry that I left you there to deal with that alone

///


—Apparently, J. Cole (2014)



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