The United States Census Bureau reports that about 13% of the population is made up of African Americans. You would think that somewhere around 10-15% of all business sales receipts would go to African Americans. That is not the case.
According to the U.S. Census Department Economic Census Report for 1997, African American businesses account for only a little more than one third of one percent of the total sales and receipts of all businesses nationally.
This means that for every $100 spent with American businesses, Black businesses get 354 .
What makes this even worst than it is, is I never knew this. This is news. This is vitally important information We need in our neighborhood. But it= s never been put out there. I= ve never seen anything even remotely like this in the daily newspapers in Trenton or anywhere else.
This is painful. Do you realize the position We are in? Money is what drives the American machine. It is what moves communities to another level. We simply do not have the economic wherewithal to move forward. We cannot support ourselves. Isn= t that what slavery is about. We are economic slaves. We= ve been economic slaves in this country since 1619. That= s why we were brought here then, and nothing has changed. During the time of chattel slavery we had to be close to this output. In 400 years we= ve gained only 1/3 of one percent of the business in America.
A little more than one third of one percent (1/3 of 1%)!!!!!
We hear all this talk about reverse discrimination and how affirmative action laws have hurt white businesses. That is so much bull. White man complaining isn= t about their being hurt, it= s about keeping us in chains. Anybody who begrudges us any amount of business is talking about keeping us as slaves. A little more than one third of one percent of the American economic pie. With that small of a piece of the pie we don= t even get an apple slice. The most we get is a little taste of the juice from this pie.
We=ve wondered why we haven= t been able to pull ourselves up by our bootstraps. We don= t have no damn boots! This is pathetic. This is our reward after 400 hundred years of hard work here in America. Don= t misunderstand, we=ve worked our collected butts off in this country. We=ve worked and educated ourselves, we are not a dumb or lazy people, we have positioned ourselves to compete with anybody. However, we are an oppressed people.
As hard as we have worked for so many years, to have so little is shameful. It= s not our shame, any more than slavery is our shame, it= s the shame of this country. That= s why you don= t hear anything about this. Can you imagine the president telling the world that > our 45 million African Americans do a combined business in this country of a little more than one third of one percent of the country= s total business.=
To hide their shame they report that minority businesses are making the biggest increases in the country. That Black business development is growing at a faster percent than the general economy. This is an example from a press release from the U.S. Census Department:
Minority-Owned Firms Grow Four Times Faster Than National Average, Census Bureau Reports
Minority-owned businesses grew more than four times as fast as U.S. firms overall between 1992 and 1997, increasing from 2.1 million to about 2.8 million firms, according to a report released today by the Commerce Department's Census Bureau.
The 30 percent growth rate exceeded the 7 percent increase for all U.S. firms, which jumped from 17.3 million in 1992 to 18.4 million in 1997.
Receipts of all minority-owned firms (excluding C corporations) rose 60 percent to $335.3 billion in 1997, compared with a 40 percent increase for all U.S. firms over the same period.
In releasing the report, Under Secretary for Economic Affairs Kathleen B. Cooper said, "We are pleased to report that this portrait of the American economy shows rapidly expanding opportunities for minority entrepreneurs and a more diverse universe of small businesses."
This is the crap they feed us. This way we are lead to believe we are doing so good. But it keeps ringing through my head that of all the business done in this country, Black peoples= businesses do only 1/3 of 1% of it. This is like saying if you were a salesman and your commission was 1/3 of 1% and you sold a $100 worth of a thing to someone. You would earn 354 on the sale. If you sold $1000 worth of goods you would receive $3.50.
You spend all your time and energy to get these sales. You buy, wash and iron your good clothes, polish your shoes, get your hair done, buy a car and maintain it, feed yourself, study and learn your technique, make the calls, get the prospects, make the sale C then get a quarter for all your hard work. You can= t feed yourself or your family on that.
With that kind of return on your labor, eventually you will die, your children will die. Is this America= s plan for us?
That= s what is happening to us. We can= t survive on 354 , for every $100 our labor produces. You can see the results of this all around you. When we look at our neighborhoods, our schools, our health care, our everything C 354 on every $100 is > a prescription for death= . If this doesn= t make you mad, you= re already dead!
What have our representatives done to help us? I don= t know of a damn thing. We just went through the election season and I don= t recall hearing one word about increasing the slice of the pie Black people and other people of color will get. Our elected representatives must come forward and lead us to greater involvement in the American way of life.
Even when Blacks control the money, they still give the lion= s share of the business to white companies.
Take this example: Trenton Board of Education is expecting to spend about $350 million dollars on school construction in the next few years. If Black companies get what they have been getting in the past, they will get about $1 million dollars of that total. White businesses will receive the remaining $349 million dollars. How can you expect our communities to improve with figures like that? You can= t.
Don= t misunderstand, it isn=t just Black people who are getting so little from this economic pie, it= s all people of color. Some are doing better than we are but none of us are doing good. The total sales and receipts of all minority businesses is only 3% of the American total. That means about 30% of the population is doing 3% of the business in this country and white people receive the other 97%.
You would think with numbers like that our government and courts would be doing everything in their power to spread the wealth. But they are doing the exact opposite.
On every level affirmative action is being attacked. Set asides have been outlawed by the courts. Educational preferences are a thing of the past. They justify this by saying they don= t want to discriminate against white people.
What has happened in this country is white people used and abused people of color by whatever means necessary, i.e. laws, courts, government, the rope, until they got things exactly the way they wanted them. Then they started enforcing the laws of the land. Laws that ensure We will never get our fair share of the money.
Once they got everything the way they wanted it, then they said A the law bars any type of racial discrimination, so affirmative action for people of color is not legal.@ They used and abused the law and now they are using and abusing the law. What the _ _ _ _?
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