Reparations are going to cost a lot of money but the U.S. is a wealthy country and can afford to pay for its misdeeds, Julia Craven wrote in Huffington Post. Craven created #RunThatBack, a series about Black pop culture with Taryn Finley. She says it’s time to pay restitution.
For perspective, consider that in fiscal year 2014, the U.S. government spent $3.5 trillion, which is just 20 percent of the country’s gross domestic product of about $17.5 trillion, Craven wrote. “We could just divvy it up among eligible Black Americans, but reparations advocates propose a more institution-based approach.”
Reparations advocate William Darity, for example, suggests that financial payouts be divided between individual recipients and a variety of endowments set up to develop the economic strength of the Black community.
“One could think of Black America as being a community that could benefit from development investments,” Darity said. “So you could have a trust fund that was set up to finance higher education, (another) to create greater opportunities for opening one’s own business, and so forth.”
