Have we really achieved racial equality?

Question

In America, whites have 26 times the wealth of African-Americans. So says census data.

Not 26% more. Not twice as much. Twenty six times as much. Specifically, the median household wealth (net worth) for white, non-hispanic housholds in 2009 was $149,900, and the median household wealth for African-Americans was $5,677.

These numbers confirm just how hard the Great Recession has whacked minority households.

But there is a deeper issue. Can someone please explain to me how, in a country where we are told again and again that we are “all created equal,” after 150 years, one group ends up with 26 times more capital resources than the other?

MLK’s dream was that his four young children would “one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character.” What are we supposed to think – that one group has twenty six times as much character as another?

Have we really achieved racial equality?

When answering, please identify the state where you were born.

Mancrunch · Accepted Answer

We have probably done as much as we can under the law to assure legal equality, but something is missing when the economic disparity between the races is so great. Perhaps because of racial prejudice prior to the 1970's, African Americans have been caught in the same trap that all other Americans have been also. That is, there has been little increase in prosperity of the middle class and even backward movement in the poorer classes, which has been very unlike any other time in American history. Since they were reduced to the poorest by the time of the civil rights movement, and thenneocon policies introduced by Reagan, Bush 1, and Bush 2 favored the top 5% at the expense of all other Americans, no gains by any other Americans in the lower 95% took place, and African Americans even went backwards along with the other poor.

The solution therefore, is to regress to pre-neocon policies and tax structures of the last 40 years and increase taxes on the wealthy by both increasing the top income tax rates and closing the outrageous tax loopholes, including the reduced rates for capital gains.

holleman · Answer

And the better a million% (alongside with Oprah Winfrey and could Smith) have hundreds of cases extra wealth than than the common midsection type person of any race. So it is not very almost race, it is a pair of winner take all device that leaves maximum of its individuals interior the airborne dirt and dust. collectively as maximum wealthy everyone seems to be white, maximum white everyone isn't wealthy. Dr. King marched for all damaging human beings, not merely African-individuals. we have not performed racial parity yet i recognize adequate damaging whites and adequate wealthy blacks to renowned that the paradigm is shifting and that the class into which one is born has extra to do with fulfillment than merely the colour of one's pores and skin.

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Have we really achieved racial equality?

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