I have a problem with this article because it feels like it’s about "what do we give blacks" vs. how do we get rid of barriers to entry so they can create their own wealth?

For example, one of the best ways to create wealth is to start a small business. Blacks from Africa and the Caribbean as well as immigrants from all over the world come to the US and do this, but do native born blacks? Even native born whites are less likely to start a business than immigrants.

If more blacks (as well as others who are struggling with poverty) became business owners then they would be able to start to make their own wealth.

Part of the problem is that politicians, usually Democrats, put up barriers to entry for people who want to start their own business. For example, if a poor black woman wants to cut peoples’ hair and has a potential clientele, why can’t she just do it? But instead she has to spend thousands of dollars to get certified, licensed, etc. In the immigrant community, often families will pool their resources to overcome this type of barrier, but why should anyone have to? BTW, this is an area where Republicans tend to be better than Democrats.

There is also the problem of Social Security. Because black men often die young, this program basically uses the earnings of black men to subsidize white women. That’s because a black man who dies at 70 will not collect nearly as much as he put in, and a white woman who dies at 85 will collect a lot more than she put into the program.

One idea that was floated was to allow people to own part of their social security fund. The reason this would have helped black people — they could leave the money to their children and grandchildren. Of course, since this was a Republican idea, it was trashed, but it was one way that blacks might have started to chip away at the difference in wealth because right now black children inherit less from their parents than those of other races. Allowing part of social security to be privatized would have helped get rid of this difference.

One of the problems with the political divisiveness in this country is that people judge the merit of an idea based on the messenger. As an independent thinker, sometimes I like ideas posed by Democrats (for example, I agreed with a lot of what Andrew Yang proposed) and sometimes I like ideas posed by Republicans. I wish people would put aside their emotions and evaluate ideas based on the facts.

Also, when it comes to helping any person, including a black person, it’s much more empowering to help them help themselves. Black history is full of strong, powerful voices. We can acknowledge that they are powerful people by not assuming they “need” others — they can lift themselves up, they just need us to stop kneeling on their necks.