Paying The Social Debt: What White America Owes Black America

Paying the Social Debt This page intentionally left blank Paying the Social Debt WHAT WHITE AMERICA OWES BLACK AMERICA Richard F. America PRAEGER Westport, Connecticut London Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data America, Richard F. Paying the social debt : what White America owes Black America / Richard F. America, p. cm. Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 0-275-94450-6 1. United States—Social policy—1980- 2. United States—Social conditions—1980- 3. Income distribution—United States. 4. Social conflict—United States. I. Title. HN59.2.A43 1993 305.8 '96073-dc20 93-2861 British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data is available. Copyright © 1993 by Richard F. America All rights reserved. No portion of this book may be reproduced, by any process or technique, without the express written consent of the publisher. Library of Congress Catalog Card Number: 93-2861 ISBN: 0-275-94450-6 First published in 1993 Praeger Publishers, 88 Post Road West, Westport, CT 06881 An imprint of Greenwood Publishing Group, Inc. Printed in the United States of America The paper used in this book complies with the Permanent Paper Standard issued by the National Information Standards Organization (Z39.48-1984). 10 987654321 To My Great Grandparents, William Anderson and Ellen Craighead Anderson, Samuel Goode and Elizabeth Pitts Goode, Francis Caldwell and Mary Millis Caldwell, and Moses America and Clara Price America, whose generation, and those before, helped build the country, but went largely unrewarded. And to Robert F. Kennedy and Martin Luther King, Jr., who seemed to intuitively understand that reparations are justified and will benefit the nation many times over. This page intentionally left blank Fondly do we hope, fervently do we pray, that this mighty scourge of war may speedily pass away. Yet, if God wills that it continue, until all the wealth piled by the bondsmen's two hundred and fifty years of unrequited toil shall be sunk, and until every drop of blood drawn with. the lash shall be paid by another drawn with the sword, as was said three thousand years ago, so still it must be said, "the judgments of the Lord are true and righteous altogether. —Abraham Lincoln Every idea is an incitement. —Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr. This page intentionally left blank Contents Preface Acknowledgments Introduction 1. Measuring the Social Debt 2. Viewing Social Policy Through the Restitution Lens 3. How to Pay the Debt 4. Creative Antitrust: Subsidized Social Divestiture 5. Narrow Inequalities in Income and Wealth 6. Affirmative Action, Competitiveness, and Productivity 7. Invest in Reducing Crime 8. Discourage Immature Parenting and Welfare Dependency 9. Invest in Persuasive Communications xi xiii 1 17 27 37 45 53 61 75 10. The Social Debt and Tax Reform 11. Security, Productivity, Competitiveness, Economic Strategy, and Restitution Notes 107 115 123 Selected Bibliography Index 129 133 87 93 This page intentionally left blank Preface We should pay the have nots, the poor and marginal, what we owe them. We can do that by investing in their education and training, housing, and health. That will benefit them and all the rest of us. We should also invest in crime prevention, business formation, and community development. That will help the poor and marginal become independent and fully functioning contributors to society. In the end, all this assistance will ease the financial and psychic burden on everyone else and will increase U.S. productivity and competition. Our present economic distress can be traced in part to the economic injustices that the haves' ancestors committed against the have nots' ancestors. This indictment, though all inclusive, is essentia