Slavery made the US wealthy, and racist policies since have blocked African American wealth-building. Can we calculate the economic damage?
Sources:
Introduction
https://theconversation.com/slavery-in-america-back-in-the-headlines-33004
https://www.civil-war.net/census.asp?census=Total
1.
1.5 million pounds in 1790 and 2.25 billion pounds in 1859, based on Empire of Cotton, by Sven Beckert (2014) pgs. 104, 106
77% based on: Cotton and Race in the Making of America: The Human Costs of Economic Power, by Gene Dattel (2009)
https://mshistorynow.mdah.state.ms.us/articles/161/cotton-in-a-global-economy-mississippi-1800-1860
Joshua Rothman, email correspondence, 2015
https://eh.net/encyclopedia/the-economics-of-the-civil-war/
https://abrahamlincolnsclassroom.org/abraham-lincoln-in-depth/abraham-lincoln-and-civil-war-finance
48.3% in 1860 according to Gavin Wright, Slavery and American Economic Development (LSU Press, 2006, paperback 2013) [personal communication]
2.
https://scholarship.law.upenn.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1073&context=jlasc
https://www.archives.gov/exhibits/featured_documents/dc_emancipation_act/
https://www.cjcj.org/uploads/cjcj/documents/slavery_in.PDF
The Politics of Despair: Power and Resistance in the Tobacco Wars. Tracy Campbell, 2015
7% based on: Documents of the Assembly of the State of New York, Vol. 4. 1979.
3.
https://www.ssa.gov/policy/docs/ssb/v70n4/v70n4p49.html
70-80%, according to: https://www.theatlantic.com/features/archive/2014/05/the-case-for-reparations/361631/#ii-a-difference-of-kind-not-degree
https://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/CREC-2010-08-05/html/CREC-2010-08-05-pt1-PgS6836.htm
https://www.racialequitytools.org/resourcefiles/lui.pdf
https://scholarship.law.upenn.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1073&context=jlasc
4.
https://www.census.gov/content/dam/Census/library/publications/2014/demo/p60-249.pdf
Dime based on: https://www.insightcced.org/uploads/CRWG/LayingTheFoundationForNationalProsperity-MeizhuLui0309.pdf
https://newsreel.org/guides/race/whiteadv.htm
$59 trillion: https://activistteacher.blogspot.com/2013/01/calculated-minimum-reparation-due-to.html
$15 trillion: National Legal and Policy Center, https://www.newsmax.com/Newsfront/obama-reparations-black-farmers/2010/02/21/id/350458/
$25 trillion: https://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/WPcap/1999-11/23/047r-112399-idx.html
Martin Luther King: https://www.theroot.com/articles/history/2014/07/mlk_s_case_for_reparations_included_disadvantaged_whites.html
Join us in defending the truth before it’s too late
The future of independent journalism is uncertain, and the consequences of losing it are too grave to ignore. To ensure Truthout remains safe, strong, and free, we need to raise $29,000 in the next 36 hours. Every dollar raised goes directly toward the costs of producing news you can trust.
Please give what you can — because by supporting us with a tax-deductible donation, you’re not just preserving a source of news, you’re helping to safeguard what’s left of our democracy.