Why reparations for slavery could help boost the economy

Reuters ^ | June 4, 2014 | Michael Maiello

[C19fan]

In the May 21 issue of The Atlantic, Ta-Nehisi Coates re-opened the question of whether the United States government should pay reparations to African-Americans for the crimes of two and a half centuries of slavery, 60 years of Jim Crow-style segregation and decades more of racist housing policies, zoning and community development. His conclusion — that a great accounting of wrongs must take place, as well as a decision about how to make amends for them– has inevitably sparked disagreement. But set that aside. Imagine we have decided yes, as a society we must pay a price for these injustices, and it must be large. Those payments could well constitute the stimulus that the U.S. economy needs to take it into the next century.

To the economy, stimulus is stimulus, as long as it’s done right. Whether it is paid to a group of people based on where they live, their ethnicity or their religion might matter to politics, but to the economy, it doesn’t matter – as long as the money is put to work through either consumption or investment. The reparations-as-stimulus idea gets a short mention from Coates, who writes that:

[stanne]

Blacks voted for Obama 93% Ninety Three percent!!

Ed Morrissey reports that they support Obama 87%. Now.

While he is destroying our economy.

While he is below fifty percent approval rating for every job he is doing, not even recognizing that destruction IS what he’s doing.

I think the proper reparation here is going to come after he is out of office and some American at least attempts to fix what he’s done.

And whoever thinks that his getting slammed for this traitor trade deal will stop him from emptying out GITMO is not paying attention to BOs loyalties, and they are NOT with the blacks in this country

[twister881]

Any piece of chicken in a storm... ;)

[ßuddaßudd]

Im willing to bet,, that POS Øbama is actually considering this . .

[E. Pluribus Unum]

The basic premise here is to take money away from people who would save and invest it and transfer it to people who will spend it the instant it touches their hot little hands, the net result being that members of the big-government/big-corporate crony-fascist complex can harvest money that would otherwise be tied up as assets of the working class.

[DoodleDawg]

If reparations for blacks is economically stimulating then wouldn’t reparations for everyone do even more to stimulate the economy?

[Hostage]

These reparations people think all that needs to be done is to print or digitally create the money. And judging by how Obama’s people have accounted for the trillions handed over to them, reparations will be a cesspool of corruption.

[Pietro]

"Those payments could well constitute the stimulus that the U.S. economy needs to take it into the next century"

Just like obama's trillion $$ stimulus really got the economy humming.

Oh, wait.........

[Dilbert San Diego]

I also want a waiver. My family came to America in the 1880s on both sides of my family. We had nothing to do with slavery.

The liberal view of us, is that we benefited from “white privilege”, and that’s why our families became middle class. So we are on the hook for any reparations.

[stanne]

My people came from Ireland in the 1850s to 1890s and lived in the NINA northern cities. They built NYC - bricklayers.

I have never expected any reparations and I’ve never taken away anyone’s right or ability to work, get an education or advance themselves.

But I’ve been treated as such, especially when working alongside SEIU.

I don’t expect them to give me reparations for the hatred and distraction they imposed. I just hope they stop listening to the race marketers and get to work.

If they’re talking about me giving them reparations for some wacky slave traders, slave owners somewhere hundreds of years ago, because I am white, then we’re going to have to have a national conversation about race relations in this country since BO took office.

WE were coming along just fine.

this might be a last attempt. The Jesse Jacksons and Al Sharptons are fading away.

[ladyjane]

We have given Blacks who were never slaves things they have used to gain positions they have no credentials for save for the color of their skin.

Thousands of blacks were slave OWNERS. Some were slave breeders. What about the blacks who sold other blacks into slavery? And their descendants want reparations?

I want to win the lottery. Doesn't mean it's going to happen.

[BitWielder1]

Slavery was bad, we get that.
How is taking money from A who never had a slave and give to B who never was a slave supposed to make up for that?
Money changing hands without any recompense is just another form of slavery.
It does not add anything to the economy.

[Iron Munro]

Okay.

Pay a reasonable amount in reparations to any black who can document the fact they were held in slavery by a white here in the USA.

[Maceman]

You could get rich making adult movies. It doesn’t mean it’s the right thing to do. i.e. financial benefits or losses miss the point here.

Financial benefits ARE the point. And the fact is that there are none. Forcing a transfer of money from one group to another creates no real financial value for the economy, and has a "stimulus" effect only in the deluded minds of Keynesian economists who consistently demonstrate willful ignorance about the Broken Window Fallacy.

But you are correct that so-called "reparations" are morally wrong in any case.

[dfwgator]

If you took all the money from the rich and gave it to the poor, the rich would get it all back within a matter of months.

Communists solved that little problem, they just shot the rich.

[Wyatt's Torch]

Lottery tickets and malt liquor aren’t exactly the same time of lasting stimulus as roads and bridges...

[Mouton]

I believe those “reparations” were paid between 1861 and 1865.

[Ditter]

Very well said!

[Resolute Conservative]

I want reparations for all the unnecessary and wasted tax dollars I have had taken from me.

I want reparations for all the money I have spent on items that cost 3-4 time more than they should become government has inserted itself into the market place and help drive inflation up while stifling income potential.

I want reparations for all the angst I have felt over my life from watching my beloved country circle the drain because of pandering to special interest groups, foreign countries, and protected classes of deviants and losers.

[Roman_War_Criminal]

It’ll never be enough—ever! So sick of the demands that they make.

Eventually these things will sort themselves out. Nature has her ways of sorting out the non-producers.

[Above My Pay Grade]

I am for reparations. Every living American who was alive in 1865, should get $1 million for every year they were in slavery. I will personally pay the bill.