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Reparations for black Americans (1 Viewer)

zftcg said:
I thought the issue with Rand was that she was a crazy cult leader.
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C'mon now. 

I'm no Objectivist, but to call it a cult is silliness. tim is talking about Rand's complete isolationism, atheism as a moral requirement, and the privatization of everything.  

 
TobiasFunke said:
I made this same point around here when it was first published; it's much more nuanced than what people have generally thought when they hear the word "reparations," so the title seemed needlessly provocative.

OTOH it certainly got the article some much-needed attention. So :shrug:
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The headline is what made me read it. I have a lot of respect for Coates and I said, "Oh, I want to see him explain how this could work."

(Also, just to make sure everyone knows, magazine writers generally don't come up with their own headlines, although it's possible in a case like this Coates had input).

 
rockaction said:
And mine came over as Slav peasant farmers in the 20th century and were immediately in poverty and faced institutional discrimination, both in terms of ethnicity and religion. 

I'm not sure exactly what I owe.   
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IMO you owe an honest appraisal of the scope and extent of discrimination faced by African-Americans in this country over centuries right up until the present day and its impact on their welfare. 

Comparing it to the hardships our (presumably white) ancestors faced when they came to this country 100 years ago ain't it.

 
zftcg said:
The headline is what made me read it. I have a lot of respect for Coates and I said, "Oh, I want to see him explain how this could work."

(Also, just to make sure everyone knows, magazine writers generally don't come up with their own headlines, although it's possible in a case like this Coates had input).
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Nor do authors of political/non-fiction books. Most of us know that.  

 
TobiasFunke said:
IMO you owe an honest appraisal of the scope and extent of discrimination faced by African-Americans in this country over centuries right up until the present day and its impact on their welfare. 

Comparing it to the hardships our (presumably white) ancestors faced when they came to this country 100 years ago ain't it.
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Yep. I agree that I benefit from the color of my skin.  

Not exactly sure what I owe

 
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rockaction said:
C'mon now. 

I'm no Objectivist, but to call it a cult is silliness. tim is talking about Rand's complete isolationism, atheism as a moral requirement, and the privatization of everything.  
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I was mostly being flip. I'm the furthest thing from a Rand scholar, but I read an article about her once by Jonathan Chait (who, to be fair, hates her with a burning passion) that included these passages:

The subculture that formed around her—a cult of the personality if ever there was one—likewise came to resemble a Soviet state in miniature. Beginning with the publication of The Fountainhead, Rand began to attract worshipful followers. She cultivated these (mostly) young people interested in her work, and as her fame grew she spent less time engaged in any way with the outside world, and increasingly surrounded herself with her acolytes, who communicated in concepts and terms that the outside world could not comprehend.

Rand called her doctrine “Objectivism,” and it eventually expanded well beyond politics and economics to psychology, culture, science (she considered the entire field of physics “corrupt”), and sundry other fields. Objectivism was premised on the absolute centrality of logic to all human endeavors. Emotion and taste had no place. When Rand condemned a piece of literature, art, or music (she favored Romantic Russian melodies from her youth and detested Bach, Mozart, Beethoven, and Brahms), her followers adopted the judgment. Since Rand disliked facial hair, her admirers went clean-shaven. When she bought a new dining room table, several of them rushed to find the same model for themselves.

[...]

She allowed him to run the Nathaniel Branden Institute, a small society dedicated to promoting Objectivism through lectures, therapy sessions, and social activities. The courses, he later wrote, began with the premises that “Ayn Rand is the greatest human being who has ever lived” and “Atlas Shrugged is the greatest human achievement in the history of the world.” Rand also presided over a more select circle of followers in meetings every Saturday night, invitations to which were highly coveted among the Objectivist faithful. These meetings themselves were frequently ruthless cult-like exercises, with Rand singling out members one at a time for various personality failings, subjecting them to therapy by herself or Branden, or expelling them from the charmed circle altogether.

[...]

Sex and romance loomed unusually large in Rand’s worldview. Objectivism taught that intellectual parity is the sole legitimate basis for romantic or sexual attraction. Coincidentally enough, this doctrine cleared the way for Rand—a woman possessed of looks that could be charitably described as unusual, along with abysmal personal hygiene and grooming habits—to seduce young men in her orbit. Rand not only persuaded Branden, who was twenty-five years her junior, to undertake a long-term sexual relationship with her, she also persuaded both her husband and Branden’s wife to consent to this arrangement. (They had no rational basis on which to object, she argued.) But she prudently instructed them to keep the affair secret from the other members of the Objectivist inner circle.
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If you want to argue that those descriptions are unfair, have at it. I don't particularly care about her history; I'm bothered a lot more by the generations of simplistic libertarians who read Atlas Shrugged in college and are convinced it explains the world. I'm even more bothered by the fact that a distressingly large number of those people went on to become Republican office holders.

 
rockaction said:
Nor do authors of political/non-fiction books. Most of us know that.  
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Actually I didn't know that. If I ever poured two years of my life into a book, I'd damn sure want final sign-off on the title. That was why it wouldn't surprise me if The Atlantic editors allowed Coates to have some input. That piece was like a book inside a magazine.

 
zftcg said:
I was mostly being flip. I'm the furthest thing from a Rand scholar, but I read an article about her once by Jonathan Chait (who, to be fair, hates her with a burning passion) that included these passages:

If you want to argue that those descriptions are unfair, have at it. I don't particularly care about her history; I'm bothered a lot more by the generations of simplistic libertarians who read Atlas Shrugged in college and are convinced it explains the world. I'm even more bothered by the fact that a distressingly large number of those people went on to become Republican office holders.
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I wrote my senior political science thesis on Ayn Rand. I've read almost everything she's ever written. I'm also not a fan after reading all of that stuff. At all. As Whittaker Chambers said of Atlas Shrugged and its militant unfeeling atheism, "To the gas chamber, go." He set the National Review standard for how Rand's militancy would be handled, and the right always used Rand to their own degrees and own ends rather than adopting her entire philosophy.  

She was a difficult personality, with Soviet-style (Chait was not wrong about this) excommunications from her immediate circle. She had an affair with Branden. She was not, by all accounts, a very tolerant, giving, nor winsome person. She was cold, hard, and dogmatic. But there was no cult to speak of. If you were being flip, that's fair. She was not, by American standards, a nice or tolerant lady, and many people felt that she was a bad person. 

But she was brilliant. She foresaw the rise of Reagan when he was governor of California. She predicted a lot of problems that would go along with nationalizing industry and regulatory creep. She also foresaw the many people that would be dissatisfied with the state of affairs that we have today. She got a lot of things right, though as tim pointed out, her prognostication tended to be more effective as criticism than her solutions were efficacious.  

One caveat about the Republican office holders: I don't think they really read her. To her, atheism was inseparable from her entire moral outlook of the virtue of selfishness, the bedrock upon which her political philosophy rested upon. Most of the people that were claiming to read Rand were at the same time pushing Christian virtues, not the virtue of selfishness. 

Anyway, thanks for the moment. 

 
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zftcg said:
Actually I didn't know that. If I ever poured two years of my life into a book, I'd damn sure want final sign-off on the title. That was why it wouldn't surprise me if The Atlantic editors allowed Coates to have some input. That piece was like a book inside a magazine.
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Ah, that's fair. I worked for a think tank that had a publishing wing and often times the books were titled by somebody other than the author. Some insisted upon control of that, others didn't. Jonah Goldberg's Liberal Fascism, which tim hates and won't read because of the title, was chosen for him. I wouldn't personally work on something for, as you say, two years and sign off on somebody else's title for my work, but to each their own. 

 
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zftcg said:
I was mostly being flip. I'm the furthest thing from a Rand scholar, but I read an article about her once by Jonathan Chait (who, to be fair, hates her with a burning passion) that included these passages:

If you want to argue that those descriptions are unfair, have at it. I don't particularly care about her history; I'm bothered a lot more by the generations of simplistic libertarians who read Atlas Shrugged in college and are convinced it explains the world. I'm even more bothered by the fact that a distressingly large number of those people went on to become Republican office holders.
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"An honest man is one who knows he can't consume more than he has produced."   -Ayn Rand

Works for me.

 
rockaction said:
I actually think the best argument for reparations is the housing/covenant problem that existed in the fifties and sixties. 

It's weird, you'd figure slavery would be, but there are so many problems with that argument because of immigration patterns and the impossibility of tracing lineage and family history that the administration of reparations for slavery becomes very problematic at best.  
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Absolutely. Plus exclusion from a lot of the benefits under the GI bill.

 
rockaction said:
I wrote my senior political science thesis on Ayn Rand. I've read almost everything she's ever written. I'm also not a fan after reading all of that stuff. At all. As Whittaker Chambers said of Atlas Shrugged and its militant unfeeling atheism, "To the gas chamber, go." He set the National Review standard for how Rand's militancy would be handled, and the right always used Rand to their own degrees and own ends rather than adopting her entire philosophy.  

She was a difficult personality, with Soviet-style (Chait was not wrong about this) excommunications from her immediate circle. She had an affair with Branden. She was not, by all accounts, a very tolerant, giving, nor winsome person. She was cold, hard, and dogmatic. But there was no cult to speak of. If you were being flip, that's fair. She was not, by American standards, a nice or tolerant lady, and many people felt that she was a bad person. 

But she was brilliant. She foresaw the rise of Reagan when he was governor of California. She predicted a lot of problems that would go along with nationalizing industry and regulatory creep. She also foresaw the many people that would be dissatisfied with the state of affairs that we have today. She got a lot of things right, though as tim pointed out, her prognostication tended to be more effective as criticism than her solutions were efficacious.  

One caveat about the Republican office holders: I don't think they really read her. To her, atheism was inseparable from her entire moral outlook of the virtue of selfishness, the bedrock upon which her political philosophy rested upon. Most of the people that were claiming to read Rand were at the same time pushing Christian virtues, not the virtue of selfishness. 

Anyway, thanks for the moment. 
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Sounds like you are ... not the furthest thing from a Rand scholar.

Seriously, awesome post. One day the topic of my undergrad history thesis may come up on this board, and when that day comes, I hope you will return the favor and indulge me.  :D

IIRC, Paul Ryan had some line about how he reconciled his support for Rand with his own Catholicism. But yes, she was very emphatic that you had to embrace her entire worldview, which most Republicans obviously do not do.

 
rockaction said:
Ah, that's fair. I worked for a think tank that had a publishing wing and often times the books were titled by somebody other than the author. Some insisted upon control of that, others didn't. Jonah Goldberg's Liberal Fascism, which tim hates and won't read because of the title, was chosen for him. I wouldn't personally work on something for, as you say, two years and sign off on somebody else's title for my work, but to each their own. 
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Isn't it more like, "You're a first-time author and we're the only thing standing between you and the discount bin, so if we tell you the title of the book will be Jump your only response should be 'How high?'"

 
zftcg said:
Isn't it more like, "You're a first-time author and we're the only thing standing between you and the discount bin, so if we tell you the title of the book will be Jump your only response should be 'How high?'"
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Exactly. You nailed it.  

 
Warren seems intent on sabotaging the Democrats. Stuff like this increases the likelihood of King Donald staying where he is.

 
Now I’m sorry I brought up Rand; should have known better. I’d be happy at some point to discuss her various strengths and weaknesses (the latter outweigh the former) in a different thread. I only mentioned her here as one of a long line of critics of American society whose criticism is much more important and vital than their proposed solutions to the problems they raise. 

 
This thread raises a lot of good issues, and one of them I’d like to discuss is how people react to ideas. rockaction hit it on the head earlier when I used the wrong phrase in “sound bytes”- what I meant is what he stated: a quick reaction of “Hell no not my problem”. I have encountered somewhat of a similar reaction to Basic Income Guarantee, actually to ALL proposed social programs that involve the government giving financial help. It goes like this: 

I worked hard my whole life, achieved what I have through my own efforts. Why should I have to pay to help other people who didn’t work as hard as I have? 

Or

There is no such thing as collective responsibility. I’m not a bigot, I treat everyone equally. Why should I have to pay for what others did in the past? 

Agree or disagree with these arguments, there’s no denying that they’re ingrained in the American psyche. They’re part of what got Trump elected (and lots of people before him as well.) We’re not going to get rid of them anytime soon. 

 
timschochet said:
Now I’m sorry I brought up Rand; should have known better. I’d be happy at some point to discuss her various strengths and weaknesses (the latter outweigh the former) in a different thread. I only mentioned her here as one of a long line of critics of American society whose criticism is much more important and vital than their proposed solutions to the problems they raise. 
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Brief digression. No biggie. Hopefully I didn't paddle stomp the thread.  

 
TobiasFunke said:
Also FWIW here is the statement Harris gave to the Times on this issue:

“We have to be honest that people in this country do not start from the same place or have access to the same opportunities,” she said. “I’m serious about taking an approach that would change policies and structures and make real investments in black communities.”

Anyone who thinks this is an outrageous or even particular controversial idea ain't voting Dem anyway.
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Well yeah...anyone being honest knows this.

 
Bottomfeeder Sports said:
Trying to pick out actual ideas from the article-

  •  blamed “generations of discrimination” for black families earning far less than white households
  • “We have to be honest that people in this country do not start from the same place or have access to the same opportunities,”
  • “I’m serious about taking an approach that would change policies and structures and make real investments in black communities.”
  •  her calls for the federal government to provide special home-buying assistance to residents of communities that were adversely affected by “redlining,” the discriminatory practice of denying mortgages, usually in poor and nonwhite areas.
  • She also announced a sweeping universal child-care proposal that could strongly benefit minority communities that often have limited early childhood services.
  • Senator Cory Booker’s “baby bonds” policy aims to help poorer children by giving them a government-funded savings account that could total up to $50,000 for the lowest income brackets
  • Kirsten Gillibrand has endorsed a proposal to allow Americans without checking accounts to bank at the local post office; a disproportionate percentage of America’s unbanked population are people of color.
  • And unspecific support for reparations.
  • That reparations isn't likely to get through Congress in 2016 or 2019.
Which one exactly is unbelievable?  Did I miss something?
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No...summed up very well.

 
timschochet said:
The posts here from both sides are pretty representative. One side is arguing for a nuanced consideration of a lot of complex issues. The other side is arguing sound bytes. 

The sound bytes side is going to win. 
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This thread quickly became a pretty good metaphor for the whole "liberal echo chamber" thing too.  Started out with a group of conservatives being outraged about/ridiculing an idea.  Liberals come in to explain that the issue actually a lot more complex and nuanced, quote the supposedly "unbelievable" and "stupid" ideas to show that they're actually not that radical, and cite actual facts and articles that explore the issue further.  Conservatives then disappear completely, save for one longtime poster who never supports or defends Trump who was actually willing to get into the weeds.

Like I've said before it not the liberals drowning out the pro-Trump conservatives. It's facts and reasoning.

 
timschochet said:
The posts here from both sides are pretty representative. One side is arguing for a nuanced consideration of a lot of complex issues. The other side is arguing sound bytes. 

The sound bytes side is going to win. 
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This is representative of our entire political system, and we wonder why we get stuck with the same do-nothing congressmen

 
African-American here. Here’s how I feel about reparations:

One of the greatest travesties of the USA is how the federal government allowed blacks to be treated after the compromise of 1877. Jim Crow, Lynchings, redlining, etc. It took way too long for sweeping anti-segregation laws. 

I often wonder how different things would be if the 1964 civil rights act had included reparations (something like 20k for each person of slave descent and free college). 

In 2019 there is still racism and inequality. Reparations would have made things better had they been given 50+ years ago. 

I do not subscribe to the belief that African Americans are the same as immigrants because we are not. 

Basically, I think the time for reparations has passed. 

 
Some maths (old article)...

It is not difficult to calculate a MINIMUM amount of monetary reparation due to every single Black slave descendant living today in the USA.

If we leave out the reparations for physical violence, genocidal stress, inadmissibility to superior social classes, etc., and only take into account the stolen labor, at the today's equivalent minimum wage, then the calculation for the minimum amount due to the descendants of slaves is a simple one, as follows.

This calculation includes only the money due to ancestors and their descendants, in terms of the stolen actual labor counted in person-hours, based on a minimal economic value of that labor, adjusted at a lowest reasonable rate of interest.

Every step in the following calculation will use the lowest possible evaluators, such as to produce a MINIMUM amount due.

In the 70 year period between 1790 and 1860, there were, on average, 2 million slaves at any time in the USA. In the same period the average US population was 14 million.

Moving forward to 2000, the US population was 309 million, with 40 million slave descendants.

“We adopt the underestimate of 2% for the interest rate to be applied to the stolen income value.”

To obtain a minimal (under estimated) annual interest rate, we use the population increase from 14 million to 309 million in the 140 years from 1860 to 2000. This gives a population annually growth rate of 2.2%.

Now capital value increase interest rates in the US have been much greater that the population growth rate. Nonetheless, we adopt the underestimate of 2% for the interest rate to be applied to the stolen income value. We further apply the interest rate starting only in 1860, rather than earlier, thereby making our estimate even more of an under estimate.

The value of the stolen labor, for the period 1790 to 1860, at today's US minimum wage of $7.24 per hour is as follows. (Note that using today's minimum wage automatically corrects for valuing the historic currency to its present value.)

70 years (1790 to 1860 period only)

X

2 million slaves (average number in the period used)

X

365 days per year (OK, maybe I should exclude one day off per week?)

X

10 hours of work per day (again a minimum)

X

$7.25 per hour

=

$ 3.7 trillion

Next, I apply the 2% interest rate (compounded annually). This gives a multiplicative factor of (1.02)^140 = 16, for the 140 years from 1860 to 2000. Further compounding could be applied to bring us to the present. (Again, this is a minimum estimate.)

Compounding to 2000, therefore, gives:

$ 3.7 trillion

X

(1.02)^140 (or 16, if you prefer)

=

$ 59.2 trillion

The latter one-time payment would be easy for the USA to make, since its annual GDP is $15 trillion. (Think of a wealthy person's annual salary relative to buying a house in a safe neighbourhood.) The USA would not even need to sell any assets to achieve this modest payment.

For the 40 million Black slave descendants in the US today, the calculated reparation means that US white society owes each and every Black slave descendant a MINIMUM payment of $ 1.5 million, which is long overdue.
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TL;DR

$1,500,000 each (rounded up) to 40 million slave descendents = $59.2 trillion as of 2000.

Presumably higher with 19 years of population growth and compounded interest.

That's ONLY lost wages for ONLY 70 years (1790-1860.)

 
IMO whatever debt was owed for slavery was paid for with the blood of Union soldiers.

The conversation really should be about everything that happened after.

 
Murph said:
IMO whatever debt was owed for slavery was paid for with the blood of Union soldiers.

The conversation really should be about everything that happened after.
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Union soldiers ACW deaths = 360K

Hmmm....you said paid in blood. Most of those were from disease (by far the number one killer during the Civil War.) For every three soldiers killed in battle, five more died of disease. So roughly 135K Union combat deaths and 225K Union soldiers who died from disease.

1860 Slave population was 3.95M.

So if I'm reading this correctly, you think each soldiers life (death) was equal to 11 slaves. Or if we go with blood spilled only, around 29 slaves for each white man. Dang bro, even the constitution gave negroes credit for being 3/5ths of a person.

So, moving on to reparations of 1865-1965 when disenfranchised blacks were subjected to Jim Crow laws, segregation, separate and unequal injustice, housing discrimination, loss of accumulated wealth...this could take awhile.

 
so basically, they're saying that black skin entitles them to money and that black skin privileges them to payout from Fed Govt ?

isn't that entitlement and privilege that whites wouldn't get? 

isn't that what exactly what everyone is against right now, using color of skin for privilege and entitlements?

 
Stealthycat said:
so basically, they're saying that black skin entitles them to money and that black skin privileges them to payout from Fed Govt ?

isn't that entitlement and privilege that whites wouldn't get? 

isn't that what exactly what everyone is against right now, using color of skin for privilege and entitlements?
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Been to any indian reservations lately?

Apples and oranges. I'm referring to tribes with casinos - 422 facilities in 28 states. Enormous profits, exempt from Federal Tax. The individual tribe member disbursements are taxable. 

In my home state (Michigan), folks who belong to the Chippewa tribe receive $62K per year. Believe it was in the high 20s / low 30s back when Soaring Eagle Casino opened. How great is that? Every single person taken care of with a basic income generous enough to ensure a very comfortable life (cost of living in rural mid-Michigan is absurdly low.)

What entitles them to that payment? Nothing except their heritage/lineage. Crazy idea. It brings its own unique set of problems.

I kind of look at it this way: income inequality is worse today than at any time in history. White people have so many advantages simply from winning a birth lottery it's ridiculous. I would love to see African Americans receive massive, across the board reparations that alter the course of our history. 

I'm near retirement and hope my last 25-35 years on the planet see more and more socialism. I'm sick of what unfettered capitalism and globalism have done to our society. Profit as the highest aim of man and an economy that places profit motive above all else is not the world I want to live in. I want to see radical change. (OFF TOPIC: Let's get off fossil fuels and move on to renewable energy - there's no magic bullet, it's a broad initiative and there are many pieces to it, but we're running out of time.)

I want to see massive changes in the last third of my life. I'm not opposed to any catalyst that triggers change.

 
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Bottomfeeder Sports said:
Trying to pick out actual ideas from the article-

  •  blamed “generations of discrimination” for black families earning far less than white households
  • “We have to be honest that people in this country do not start from the same place or have access to the same opportunities,”
  • “I’m serious about taking an approach that would change policies and structures and make real investments in black communities.”
  •  her calls for the federal government to provide special home-buying assistance to residents of communities that were adversely affected by “redlining,” the discriminatory practice of denying mortgages, usually in poor and nonwhite areas.
  • She also announced a sweeping universal child-care proposal that could strongly benefit minority communities that often have limited early childhood services.
  • Senator Cory Booker’s “baby bonds” policy aims to help poorer children by giving them a government-funded savings account that could total up to $50,000 for the lowest income brackets
  • Kirsten Gillibrand has endorsed a proposal to allow Americans without checking accounts to bank at the local post office; a disproportionate percentage of America’s unbanked population are people of color.
  • And unspecific support for reparations.
  • That reparations isn't likely to get through Congress in 2016 or 2019.
Which one exactly is unbelievable?  Did I miss something?
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I feel like when you focus on race to fix past issues related to race, you feed/perpetuate it.

I think the focus should be on raising up the lower class, help poor people.  This would obviously help the communities most impacted by generations of discrimination, but it would also help current generations being crushed by the same disadvantages regardless of race.

Generally speaking I support many of the ideas and proposed programs, but not under the flag of "Reparations" and not based on the color of a persons skin.

 
I don't support the ideas related to "give poor children $50k savings accounts".

I have learned the hard way that many people without money aren't helped by giving them money.

 
I'd like to point out that this thread has covered an extremely controversial topic, and been almost completely free of the typical back-biting "boff sidez" rhetoric that typically dooms thoughtful, good-faith conversations in threads on this forum. There has been a lot of insightful, educational posting. I've learned a lot about a subject I've given very little though to. Kudos to all.

 
JohnnyU said:
What happens when you run out of other people's money?
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I'll be in the ground and forgotten.

:P

Initially I thought basic income was really wacky and beyond belief; no way we can afford to do that. The more I have researched it and studied it, though, the more convinced I have become we not only can do it, we are compelled to do it. There won't be enough jobs anyway because of increases in productivity and efficiency, so we should figure out now what to do with the bottom quintile.

There's a bell curve everywhere in life. In every aspect. Basic income merely acknowledges that. It doesn't preclude innovation or sustainable growth IMO. But those are definitely points worthy of debate.

 
Anyway, I'm drifting into conflating several things here that aren't on point. Tribal gaming revenue payments, basic income - those don't relate directly to reparations for descendents of slaves.

My overarching point is I think there are many things we could do with ease - because of our extraordinary wealth as a nation - to raise the quality of life for all citizens. I am most concerned about what we can do for the bottom fifth. On that basis alone I would love to see serious discussions of reparations. 

I spend most of my time surrounded by and working to ameliorate the conditions of our most at risk residents, folks who live on the street. In NYC, 88% of homeless are people of color. That informs my viewpoint on most issues. Other than the environment / dependence on fossil fuels, there is really no other issue that galvanizes me to take action or be engaged. We have more folks living on the street than at any time in history (NYC....not sure about stats in other urban areas), and at a time when we see greater concentration of wealth at the top.

I freely admit I don't know precisely how to correct that. But I want change. I am be default opposed to anything status quo, because things are just getting worse and worse for the poor and working class poor stuck at the bottom.

 
BobbyLayne said:
Been to any indian reservations lately?
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not lately ... I lived in Albuquerque and went to several and the poverty level is/was very real absolutely

if we're painting this as blacks were held back because of slavery, natives because they were defeated when the United States took their lands ... can we also not paint the picture of poor whites across the South that never had the opportunities  because of the fall outs from the civil war and discrimination that exists because of how we talk and where we're from ?

can we also get $$$$$$$$$$$ ??? 

what's the limit and the lines on who's being treated fairly and who isn't ? at what point are we going to start saying people are responsible for their own lives regardless of what hardships they have ?

I've been listening to harder rock lately .... Bad Wolves remade Zombies ..... the story of that lead singer is incredible. he had so many things stacked against him and he battled through it all to be hugely successful 

https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/brick-brick/201808/tommy-vext-and-the-deafening-sound-self-termination

 
matuski said:
I don't support the ideas related to "give poor children $50k savings accounts".

I have learned the hard way that many people without money aren't helped by giving them money.
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what is earned is far, far more valuable than what is given

that is raising kids 101 

 
matuski said:
I don't support the ideas related to "give poor children $50k savings accounts".

I have learned the hard way that many people without money aren't helped by giving them money.
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Once upon a time I proposed setting up a near poverty level BIG among other things.   One of the issues with a BIG is whether it should be at the individual level or family level.  I proposed that it should be the same amount for every individual including children.  However, for children most of the money should be diverted to a "college" savings fund.   This would of course also be available for education in a trade.  Finally for those that don't use it for education it would go to them at some point.    That would have been much more than 50K and it would have been for all children not just poor children.  "For All" being my policy preference means I dislike this being means tested.  But let us not allow the currently unobtainable great get in the way of the doable good.

 
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NorvilleBarnes
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