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Home Ownership

Former slaves harvesting for their own profit.

Land loss has plagued black America since emancipation – is it time to look again at ‘black commons’ and collective ownership?

By Reparations

Black farmers own far less land than they did in 1910 and the racial gap in homeownership is at the highest level for 50 years. By Julian Agyeman and Kofi Boone — Underlying the recent unrest sweeping U.S. cities over police brutality is a fundamental inequity in wealth, land and power that has circumscribed black lives since the end of slavery in the U.S. The “40 acres and a mule” promised to…

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A job fair in Washington DC in August. In April 2019, when the overall unemployment rate was 3.6%, the white unemployment rate was 3.1% while the black unemployment rate was 6.7%.

Hollow boom: why black Americans feel left out of US’s robust economy

By Commentaries/Opinions

Unemployment rate tells a different story about the economy when race is considered, even when job numbers are strong. By Lauren Aratani, The Guardian — What I’ve done for African Americans in two and a half years, no president has been able to do anything like it,” Donald Trump boasted in August, the latest in a series of statements in which he has claimed to be the best president for…

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Robin Rue Simmons

As Evanston’s black population continues to drop, city officials will study reparations initiatives

By News & Current Affairs, Reparations

By Jennifer Fisher, Chicago Tribune — Over the last two decades, the black population of Evanston has been shrinking. In 2000, 22.5% of residents identified themselves as black, according to U.S. Census data. The percentage declined to 18.1% in the 2010 Census. The number has continued to fall to an estimated 16.9% in 2017, per the latest American Community Survey estimate. “Black residents are moving because of lack of affordability…

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Civil rights advocates carry placards during the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom on August 28, 1963, in Washington

Truth and Reconciliation: Addressing Systematic Racism in the United States

By Commentaries/Opinions, Editors' Choice

By Danyelle Solomon — 2019 marks the 400th anniversary of Africans sold into bondage arriving on Virginia’s shores. It has been 156 years since the signing of the Emancipation Proclamation, 55 years since the end of Jim Crow, and 51 years since the civil rights movement. All of these moments in U.S. history represent crossroads—moments where the country made a choice or where people demanded that the words on the pages of the Constitution and the Bill of Rights became more than words; that policies and practices were equitably distributed among all people, not just a select few…

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Community Land Trusts Are a Model for Reparations

By Commentaries/Opinions, Reparations

In a racialized economy, land trusts and cooperatives offer a lasting form of reparations, say activists. By Laura Flanders, Truthout — This year has already seen more Democrats talking about reparations than ever, including several running for the presidency. Now, rather than writing checks to individuals, more and more people are talking about collective strategies for repair and reparation. Community land trusts, cooperatives and mutual housing associations, for example, might…

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Presidential hopeful Cory Booker speaking at a campaign event in New Hampshire.

Why Cory Booker Is Focusing on Affordable Housing

By News & Current Affairs

A monthly tax credit for low-income renters and a “baby bond” program to help first-time homebuyers are part of the presidential hopeful’s list of proposals. By Kriston Capps, City Lab — Pledging to make housing a priority in his 2020 presidential candidacy, New Jersey Senator Cory Booker unveiled a plan on Wednesday with features that would ease affordability, homelessness, and first-time homeownership pressure for millions of families. At the core…

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"The Iron Man" sculpture of a hockey player next to the Prudential Center in Newark, where the New Jersey Devils hockey team plays. In the background, signs can be seen for Dinosaur Bar-B-Cue BBQ and Rock Plaza Lofts luxury apartments.

Where Gentrification Is an Emergency, and Where It’s Not

By Editors' Choice, Gentrification

Gentrification is geographically limited in cities, but a new study shows where it has become a crisis, particularly for low-income black households. By Brentin Mock, CityLab — Ron Daniels, president of the Baltimore-based civil-rights network Institute of the Black World 21st Century, assembled a group of some of the foremost African-American social-justice advocates, thinkers, and influencers to Newark this weekend for an emergency summit on gentrification. The emergency is that too many…

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