[Peace-discuss] [sf-core] Fwd: yesterday's article on massive racial inequality in wealth

Fri May 21 10:36:06 CDT 2010

US society is much less racist - and much more unequal - than it was 40 years ago.

In 1970 the election of a black president was unthinkable, but in that year the 
distribution of wealth (Gini index) was at its least unequal in the 20th 
century. Today it's back to where it was in the late 1920s, and the 
concentration of wealth in fewer and fewer hands is not only continuing but 
accelerating.

"...anti-racism today performs at least one of the same functions that racism 
used to — it gives us a vision of our society as organized racially instead of 
economically — while adding another function — it insists that racism is the 
great enemy to be overcome. But all the anti-racism in the world won't take any 
money away from the rich and won't give any of it to the poor." [Walter Benn 
Michaels]

On 5/21/10 9:47 AM, Ricky Baldwin wrote:
>
>
> Very interesting article. Good points. It's always good for Americans to
> see this kind of discussion and realize we don't do too well when it
> comes to this kind of basic economic "fairness," no matter how much the
> blowhards talk about the "land of opportunity." Our system just doesn't
> serve most people too well - but then, we know that. It's just good to
> have the numbers.
>
> On the numbers, I have to take issue with the "typical" white/black
> family stats, though - and not just to be picky with words. I think it
> gives a false impression.
>
> The article doesn't say, but if what's meant is "average" (mean) then it
> isn't "typical" at all in an economy with vast inequalities like the
> kind described in the article. We can, and do (as the article points
> out), have a small number of extremely wealthy people and a huge number
> of people essentially left out of that massive accumulation. What that
> amounts to is the "average" (mean) is skewed upwards - making it look
> like more people are better off than we are.
>
> "Typical" here could also be median, a.k.a. the middle number if you
> arrange all the wealth from highest to lowest, but I doubt it. It seems
> too high given the inequality the article describes. Even if so, I'd
> argue that if the range of wealth is very wide, then the median isn't
> very "typical" either.
>
> Maybe I'm missing something. I'm not 100% awake yet.
>
> Ricky
>
> "Speak your mind even if your voice shakes." - Maggie Kuhn
>
> --- On *Thu, 5/20/10, Belden Fields /<a-fields at uiuc.edu>/* wrote:
>
>
>     From: Belden Fields <a-fields at uiuc.edu>
>     Subject: [sf-core] Fwd: yesterday's article on massive racial
>     inequality in wealth
>     To: discuss at communitycourtwatch.org
>     Cc: "SFcore" <sf-core at yahoogroups.com>
>     Date: Thursday, May 20, 2010, 4:09 PM
>
>
>
>     Begin forwarded message:
>
>>     *From: *Lou Kushnick <loukushnick at mac.com
>>     </mc/compose?to=loukushnick at mac.com>>
>>     *Date: *May 20, 2010 2:01:25 AM CDT
>>     *To: *Arthur Paris <AEParis at maxwell.syr.edu
>>     </mc/compose?to=AEParis at maxwell.syr.edu>>, Melanie Bush
>>     <melanie.e.l.bush at gmail.com
>>     </mc/compose?to=melanie.e.l.bush at gmail.com>>, "Bowser, Ben"
>>     <Benjamin.bowser at csueastbay.edu
>>     </mc/compose?to=Benjamin.bowser at csueastbay.edu>>, Belden Fields
>>     <a-fields at uiuc.edu </mc/compose?to=a-fields at uiuc.edu>>, Marta Cruz
>>     Janzen <cruzjanz at fau.edu </mc/compose?to=cruzjanz at fau.edu>>, Gail
>>     Dines <gdines at wheelock.edu </mc/compose?to=gdines at wheelock.edu>>,
>>     Valerie Bristor <bristor at fau.! edu
>>     </mc/compose?to=bristor at fau.edu>>, Bonnie Muirhead
>>     <bmuirhead at ccc.edu </mc/compose?to=bmuirhead at ccc.edu>>
>>     *Subject: **yesterday's article on massive racial inequality in
>>     wealth*
>>
>
>
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