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Slave Plantation Scene. The modalities have changed since those days, but the program remains the same... |
Black Wealth Requires Black Capital: A Proposal for Strengthening the Black Financial Sector
By Grisso
Preface
This Proposal is targeted as its key audience to the Black wealthy, to key persons within the Black financial sector, and to key community leaders.
It is intended to focus the mind of this audience on this proposition: the major impediment to greater Black wealth in this country, and world-wide, is that we do not control even the economic resources which we, ourselves, generate. Instead we hand those resources over to others, whose capital allocation decisions are then not necessarily in our best interest. More perhaps than any other factor, this accounts for racial disparities in wealth, and relatedly, in unemployment. An approach is proposed to this problem which consists essentially in strengthening and expanding the Black financial sector. This approach does not rely on philanthropy, which will never be forthcoming in amounts sufficient to address the problem of racial disparities in wealth. Instead, it proposes addressing the institutional inadequacy which underlies the problem, and further proposes harnessing the financial clout of the Black wealthy in a coordinated fashion to grow the Black financial sector sufficiently to address the full dimensions of the problem. Community mobilization is also required, but that will follow if the Black wealthy lead the way. The Brief proposes arrangements to make all of this happen.
Acknowledgments. The author is grateful first of all to Amos Wilson, may he rest in peace, who thought big thoughts of what could be, and who planted the seed. I am grateful also to Robin Scott Manna, Doreen Jackson, and Agatha Neal, who gave me support , encouragement, and wise counsel, and so sustained me in this effort. Angela Cameron of the Caribbean-American Credit Union, and Elbert Saunders of Working Capital, Inc. gave generously of their time. Bill Ragland of the National Bankers Association and Gloria Battle of the Federal Reserve System helped by providing very useful data. Finally, I must give thanks to God and the ancestors, without whose guidance and insistence I would not have been sustained in this bold endeavor.
Grisso
Nov. 29, 1999
Grisso
is a 48 year old African of the diaspora.
He has a background in
"development" banking, having at one time worked for the World Bank. His email address is grisso@TheAfrican.Com. Feedback would be welcomed, especially
from those who would like to support this effort, in whatever capacity.
Contents |
Preface |
Summary |
Main Document |
Annex 1 |
Annex 2 |
Annex 3 |
Accion Study
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