The New Poor: Blacks in Memphis Lose Decades of Economic Gains

[marmar]

from the New York Times:



The New Poor
Blacks in Memphis Lose Decades of Economic Gains

By MICHAEL POWELL
Published: May 30, 2010


MEMPHIS — For two decades, Tyrone Banks was one of many African-Americans who saw his economic prospects brightening in this Mississippi River city.

A single father, he worked for FedEx and also as a custodian, built a handsome brick home, had a retirement account and put his eldest daughter through college.

Then the Great Recession rolled in like a fog bank. He refinanced his mortgage at a rate that adjusted sharply upward, and afterward he lost one of his jobs. Now Mr. Banks faces bankruptcy and foreclosure.

“I’m going to tell you the deal, plain-spoken: I’m a black man from the projects and I clean toilets and mop up for a living,” said Mr. Banks, a trim man who looks at least a decade younger than his 50 years. “I’m proud of what I’ve accomplished. But my whole life is backfiring.”

Not so long ago, Memphis, a city where a majority of the residents are black, was a symbol of a South where racial history no longer tightly constrained the choices of a rising black working and middle class. Now this city epitomizes something more grim: How rising unemployment and growing foreclosures in the recession have combined to destroy black wealth and income and erase two decades of slow progress. ..............(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/31/business/economy/31memphis.html?src=me&ref=general

[Dappleganger]

1. “The banks and Wall Street have taken the middle class and shredded us”

Pretty much sums it up.

[girl gone mad]

2. Then Washington added insult to injury..

by bailing the criminals out on the backs of working people and retirees once their Ponzi scheme finally failed.

[Starry Messenger]

3. This country makes me ill.

If I had superpowers I would liberate all the wealth tied up in the hands of greedy wall street fatasses and redistribute it all to people like Mr. Banks.

[femrap]

6. It's the Banksters, not

our nation. These Banksters did ALL of this on purpose. Minorities were targeted. They wanted them to become homeless.

OMG....it's sickening.

[laughingliberal]

4. Sad. My hometown. This is a typical scenario for a lot of working class people but Memphis had....

made some progress towards ending the racial divide in economic stability, as the article pointed out.

[NOLALady]

5. Meet the new poor.

Just like the old poor.

[burnsei sensei]

7. The truth is denied, but

remains true.
The poor need all the economic gains they make. For them, a grant is not a gift-- it is subsistence for a short period.
The poor in this country need constant attention, constant support.