Coming Soon: The Pay Check Season 3

Jackie Simmons (0:05)

Last year, like a lot of Black Americans, I started thinking more about our collective history in America and my own place in it. My family had a plot of land in East Texas near a town called Mount Pleasant. I grew up in Arizona, and as far as I was concerned, Texas was another planet. Big hats, rodeos, that showed Dallas. We drove through Mount Pleasant once, but I don't remember much. As I got older, my dad would call and talk about the Texas property. He'd daydream about all the ways that might one day give him a financial cushion. How it would buy a better life for him and my brother, who has a disability. How there might be oil on the land, or some kind of rare timber. And if I'm being honest, he planted some of those thoughts in my head, too.

Then came the pandemic and George Floyd, and I started thinking more about inequality in America, and because I'm a business journalist, the racial wealth gap.

I started digging into my past, and Texas. I learned that the land would never be our ticket to prosperity. It was gone. When I found out why, I realized my family's story isn't much different from other black Americans.

I started wondering, how did other black people build wealth in America, and how did they hold on to it, or, like my family, fail to hold on to it?

Rebecca Greenfield (1:30)

That's what we'll be exploring on this season of The Pay Check, the racial wealth gap.

The US is the richest nation in the world and has been for a long time. But while black people make up around 13% of the population, they hold just 3% of all the wealth.

Jackie Simmons (1:52)

I'm Jackie Simmons.

Rebecca Greenfield (1:54)

And I'm Rebecca Greenfield. Starting on March 11th, we'll be diving into how the racial wealth gap came to be.

SPEAKER_2 (2:00)

He was deeply, deeply racist. He couldn't have cared less about the fate of the former slaves.

And he restored white supremacy as quickly as he could.

Jackie Simmons (2:10)

What it looks like now.

SPEAKER_4 (2:11)

He was the next thing to God in this county. He controlled all the bank boards. He said, nobody lends more money in this county than I do.

And if you don't learn how to speak to me, you're not going to get any money and you won't be farming very long. I told him I didn't know what Jesus Christ nor God looked like. I said, but it can't look like you.

Rebecca Greenfield (2:33)

And what might start to close it?

SPEAKER_5 (2:35)

It is a way to repair egregious injury and crimes against humanity, against the black community.

Yes, it is reparations. Let's not call it anything else to make you feel better.

Rebecca Greenfield (2:54)

Subscribe to The Pay Check on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts. We'll see you on March 11th.