I say Obama would have to pay. On his mother’s white side he is likely descendant of white slave owners. But on his black side his father comes from Kenya and he is not the descendant of American slaves. In fact it is more likely he is the descendant of blacks in Africa who sold other blacks to the whites for slavery.
So in Obama’s case it looks like he would owe reparations.
In contrast, although I am a white person, my ancestors immigrated from eastern Europe in the 1870s which was after slavery was abolished. Therefore I’m not descended from slave owners.
However being of Jewish decent, I’m still waiting for reparations from the Egyptians for slavery.
This whole reparations thing gets more complicated if you get past the idea that all white people owe all black people a check. Perhaps it’s time to forget this color thing and decide we are all part of the human race?
is that demonstrably clear/unavoidable enough to become part of a reparations discussion? Maybe.
That sounds fair to me, bobbo. Whatever economic historians believe or don’t believe, you don’t have to be convinced that you’ve seen enough proof of a cause-and-effect relationship.
No one can disprove that without slavery America would have just had more immigrants from Europe, indentured servitude, delay everything that happened by “x” years==etc.
Certainly you’re right that a counter-factual is impossible to prove with certainty.
On the other hand, as you obviously realize, the argument is far more than merely saying that slavery was, in fact, an essential part of how the nation industrialized.
It’s an argument that it’s hard to think of a way in which industrialization could have happened in the U.S. at that time without the impact of slavery, and that without industrialization at that time, it’s hard to envision a way in which the U.S. could have industrialized later.
This is hardly iron-clad proof, but it’s not nothing, either. We know that timing was everything with industrialization. Countries which were able, for whatever internal reasons, to start industrializing early were generally able to finish that process. Countries which missed that chance, for whatever combination of reasons, were rarely, and only in highly unusual circumstances, able to industrialize later, once global markets for manufactured goods, agricultural products and commodities had become fixed.
More immigrants from Europe, as free laborers or indentured servants, is an intriguing idea, by the way. I think the problem is that it was an expanding economy, due to slavery, which drew those laborers over time.
Without slavery, the problem isn’t that the South would have lacked workers. It would have, yes, meaning that cotton and other products would be more expensive, and much production would have been shifted elsewhere. But the problem would be that the colonial economy in the North would have been vastly weaker (with much of the actual demand for northern exports being for slave plantations, and thus gone in this hypothetical).
It’s not clear that the American colonies would have become free (President Adams said that this trade was “an essential ingredient in our independence”), but certainly we can’t see how the young U.S. could have made those massive investments in industrialization in the coming decades. So I don’t think the problem would have been a lack of laborers.
Speaking of “wealth”–the first Million Dollar business in America was whaling?
Whaling was big business in New England for a while, yes, but later on. Whaling’s golden age in this country took place after the War of 1812, long after our colonial economic successes and after the textile industry began to take off.
I would also think that a “great” impetus to industrialization would be lack of a labor force
It’s more about cost savings and the speed of production. Consider that industrialization arose in Europe, and flowered primarily there. (The whole point is that the U.S. was one of the only non-European countries to be able to industrialize at this time.) Europe, as we know, had a labor glut, not a shortage. The Industrial Revolution was a huge success because it made more efficient use of those workers.
There are quite a few websites listing the number/positions of slaves.
Yes, there were some very interesting facts raised by the links posted in that thread. Such as the fact that slaves were more often owned singly, or in small numbers, not on the large plantations we tend to think about.
Slavery had pro-growth and anti-growth aspects to it. Seems ambiguous enough so that anyone can pretty much draw/project whatever attitudes they have?
Well, I don’t see history in quite that way, bobbo. For instance, I think we can say important things about the effects of slavery in the South (generating tremendous wealth, but only by building an economy limited to producing certain agriculture commodities, thus restricting future growth) and in the North (where being unable to raise valuable, slave-produced cash crops forced northerners to rely on exports to slave regions and to specialize in maritime, financial, and industrial pursuits directly connected to those slave regions, thus building the foundation for later, more advanced economic enterprises).
#812–James==how long has it been since you said all this before? Rather a fresh interesting issue for me — so YOU will tire of this way before me.
We are still being conclusionary rather than analytical.
Seems to me that countries/societies industrialize when they make the decision to do so? Korea, Japan, Singapore, Honk Kong, later China and now maybe parts of India “decided” to industrialize well after the USA did. If there had been a delay, what exactly now would have prevented the USA from industrializing? Like trying to figure out why my computer won’t show last used documents–too many variables.
You know, unless you have actually reviewed data logs of sources and uses of revenue for the various states over a length of time, I think everything is too ambiguous.
Before I forget–it matters little what would have happened had slavery not occurred BECAUSE IT DID. So, tracking the value added I think is valid even if the value would have come via some other way absent the slavery.
So there is wealth created when a Southern Plantation buys slaves and grows cotton exporting it to Northern Mills. Grower is rich but most of the money is made up North or in the Mills of Holland or where ever. A few plantation houses–everyone else in the south is and always have been poor. What did the Northerners do with the Mill Profits? By State, By year? Seems to me quite a few took the money and went to Europe to buy titles and retire—not much wealth to America. (sic, I made that up==who knows without a table/chart to reference?)
Do all those single slaves (wow, you did read a few of those links!!) helping out a white homesteader eek out a bare subsistance living “add wealth” that we are benefiting from today?
I say you have recognized only “the possibility” that the southern slave economy in fact benefited the North and the USA as a whole, but there is NO PROOF of that occurrence still providing a benefit today. If there was, we could/must be able to measure it. No measurement, no existence==just “an argument.”
How can we define the proof? Once defined, can we find it?
Not quite sure why this never got posted. I submitted it two days ago. It would have been post #30 or #31.
Cheers!
—RASTER
Ten Reasons Why Reparations for Blacks is a Bad Idea for Blacks – and Racist Too
By David Horowitz
FrontPageMagazine.com | Wednesday, January 03, 2001
One
There Is No Single Group Clearly Responsible For The Crime Of Slavery
Black Africans and Arabs were responsible for enslaving the ancestors of African-Americans. There were 3,000 black slave-owners in the ante-bellum United States. Are reparations to be paid by their descendants too?
Two
There Is No One Group That Benefited Exclusively From Its Fruits
The claim for reparations is premised on the false assumption that only whites have benefited from slavery. If slave labor created wealth for Americans, then obviously it has created wealth for black Americans as well, including the descendants of slaves. The GNP of black America is so large that it makes the African-American community the 10th most prosperous “nation” in the world. American blacks on average enjoy per capita incomes in the range of twenty to fifty times that of blacks living in any of the African nations from which they were kidnapped.
Three
Only A Tiny Minority Of White Americans Ever Owned Slaves, And Others Gave Their Lives To Free Them
Only a tiny minority of Americans ever owned slaves. This is true even for those who lived in the ante-bellum South where only one white in five was a slaveholder. Why should their descendants owe a debt? What about the descendants of the 350,000 Union soldiers who died to free the slaves? They gave their lives. What possible moral principle would ask them to pay (through their descendants) again?
Four
America Today Is A Multi-Ethnic Nation and Most Americans Have No Connection (Direct Or Indirect) To Slavery
The two great waves of American immigration occurred after 1880 and then after 1960. What rationale would require Vietnamese boat people, Russian refuseniks, Iranian refugees, and Armenian victims of the Turkish persecution, Jews, Mexicans Greeks, or Polish, Hungarian, Cambodian and Korean victims of Communism, to pay reparations to American blacks?
Five
The Historical Precedents Used To Justify The Reparations Claim Do Not Apply, And The Claim Itself Is Based On Race Not Injury
The historical precedents generally invoked to justify the reparations claim are payments to Jewish survivors of the Holocaust, Japanese-Americans and African- American victims of racial experiments in Tuskegee, or racial outrages in Rosewood and Oklahoma City. But in each case, the recipients of reparations were the direct victims of the injustice or their immediate families. This would be the only case of reparations to people who were not immediately affected and whose sole qualification to receive reparations would be racial. As has already been pointed out, during the slavery era, many blacks were free men or slave-owners themselves, yet the reparations claimants make no distinction between the roles blacks actually played in the injustice itself. Randall Robinson’s book on reparations, The Debt, which is the manifesto of the reparations movement is pointedly sub-titled “What America Owes To Blacks.” If this is not racism, what is?
Six
The Reparations Argument Is Based On The Unfounded Claim That All African-American Descendants of Slaves Suffer From The Economic Consequences Of Slavery And Discrimination
No evidence-based attempt has been made to prove that living individuals have been adversely affected by a slave system that was ended over 150 years ago. But there is plenty of evidence the hardships that occurred were hardships that individuals could and did overcome. The black middle-class in America is a prosperous community that is now larger in absolute terms than the black underclass. Does its existence not suggest that economic adversity is the result of failures of individual character rather than the lingering after-effects of racial discrimination and a slave system that ceased to exist well over a century ago? West Indian blacks in America are also descended from slaves but their average incomes are equivalent to the average incomes of whites ( and nearly 25% higher than the average incomes of American born blacks). How is it that slavery adversely affected one large group of descendants but not the other? How can government be expected to decide an issue that is so subjective – and yet so critical – to the case?
Seven
The Reparations Claim Is One More Attempt To Turn African-Americans Into Victims. It Sends A Damaging Message To The African-American Community.
The renewed sense of grievance — which is what the claim for reparations will inevitably create — is neither a constructive nor a helpful message for black leaders to be sending to their communities and to others. To focus the social passions of African-Americans on what some Americans may have done to their ancestors fifty or a hundred and fifty years ago is to burden them with a crippling sense of victim-hood. How are the millions of refugees from tyranny and genocide who are now living in America going to receive these claims, moreover, except as demands for special treatment, an extravagant new handout that is only necessary because some blacks can’t seem to locate the ladder of opportunity within reach of others — many less privileged than themselves?
Eight
Reparations To African Americans Have Already Been Paid
Since the passage of the Civil Rights Acts and the advent of the Great Society in 1965, trillions of dollars in transfer payments have been made to African-Americans in the form of welfare benefits and racial preferences (in contracts, job placements and educational admissions) – all under the rationale of redressing historic racial grievances. It is said that reparations are necessary to achieve a healing between African-Americans and other Americans. If trillion dollar restitutions and a wholesale rewriting of American law (in order to accommodate racial preferences) for African-Americans is not enough to achieve a “healing,” what will?
Nine
What About The Debt Blacks Owe To America?
Slavery existed for thousands of years before the Atlantic slave trade was born, and in all societies. But in the thousand years of its existence, there never was an anti-slavery movement until white Christians – Englishmen and Americans — created one. If not for the anti-slavery attitudes and military power of white Englishmen and Americans, the slave trade would not have been brought to an end. If not for the sacrifices of white soldiers and a white American president who gave his life to sign the Emancipation Proclamation, blacks in America would still be slaves. If not for the dedication of Americans of all ethnicities and colors to a society based on the principle that all men are created equal, blacks in America would not enjoy the highest standard of living of blacks anywhere in the world, and indeed one of the highest standards of living of any people in the world. They would not enjoy the greatest freedoms and the most thoroughly protected individual rights anywhere. Where is the gratitude of black America and its leaders for those gifts?
Ten
The Reparations Claim Is A Separatist Idea That Sets African-Americans Against The Nation That Gave Them Freedom
Blacks were here before the Mayflower. Who is more American than the descendants of African slaves? For the African-American community to isolate itself even further from America is to embark on a course whose implications are troubling. Yet the African-American community has had a long-running flirtation with separatists, nationalists and the political left, who want African-Americans to be no part of America’s social contract. African Americans should reject this temptation.
For all America’s faults, African-Americans have an enormous stake in their country and its heritage. It is this heritage that is really under attack by the reparations movement. The reparations claim is one more assault on America, conducted by racial separatists and the political left. It is an attack not only on white Americans, but on all Americans — especially African-Americans.
America’s African-American citizens are the richest and most privileged black people alive — a bounty that is a direct result of the heritage that is under assault. The American idea needs the support of its African-American citizens. But African-Americans also need the support of the American idea. For it is this idea that led to the principles and institutions that have set African-Americans – and all of us — free.
Rasterman–I think I read that at least once before but had forgotten about it with it still probably forming a lot of my current attitude. Too often Horowitz is a bit nutty for my tastes although I relate to his underdog status? Thanks for the read.
James–to restate my last post, and Horowitz not withstanding–assuming there was a benefit to America because of Slave Labor==how long will the benefit last so as to justify reparations? Again, consistent with Horowitz, doesn’t the complexity/chaos/variability/pros and cons of “life” make reparations a theoretical issue for maybe the affected generation plus 25 years and thats about it?
#84–me==always dangerous to start arguing with oneself==but James, because you have avoided the invitation a few times already, my own answer would be “No, as long as the benefit to a society can still be measured/ascertain the objective basis for reparations recovery are still present.” So, again, skip your conclusionary restatement and state the measurement of the reparations due? What were they in 1869 and what are they today? Has it been declining over time (I assume with no basis?) or have they in fact somehow compounded over the years?
And again out of interest–are there any other examples of justified reparations due to ancestors of those who were directly wronged?
Rather a fresh interesting issue for me — so YOU will tire of this way before me.
It’s actually a refreshing change of pace from the subjects and issues I usually deal with, too, bobbo.
We are still being conclusionary rather than analytical.
I think we’re simply being brief, and not drawing conclusions without argument. But if there are any conclusions you feel are being drawn out of thin air, other than what you’ve mentioned, please do let me know.
Seems to me that countries/societies industrialize when they make the decision to do so?
No. Economic historians, and political scientists studying political and economic development, agree that most countries have been unable to industrialize when they wanted to.
There are a number of issues involved, of course, but a major concern is the timing of industrialization, relative to the development of other nations. So Great Britain and other European countries were able to industrialize early, when there was plenty of demand for their products and little to hold them back. Other nations then found that they were trapped as agricultural or commodity-exporting economies.
The reason is that setting up a domestic industry is costly and difficult in an undeveloped economy. It takes massive investment and years to accomplish, and for a long time manufactured goods won’t be as cheap to mass-produce as in countries already industrialized. So who will buy the goods? Without being competitive in a large market, industry can never expand to the point where it is, in fact, competitive.
Korea, Japan, Singapore, Honk Kong, later China and now maybe parts of India “decided” to industrialize well after the USA did.
There’s a reason why you used the example of the “Asian miracle.” It’s one of the few such examples in history, and it took a century and a half after the U.S. industrialized. Who else pulled that off? Japan in the late 19th century. That’s about it.
You know, unless you have actually reviewed data logs of sources and uses of revenue for the various states over a length of time, I think everything is too ambiguous.
That’s why we rely on historical evidence and the work of historians who have spent years with the evidence.
What did the Northerners do with the Mill Profits? By State, By year? Seems to me quite a few took the money and went to Europe to buy titles and retire
Very few northern industrialists, financiers or merchants seem to have given up their businesses and moved to Europe. For example, none of the ones that I’ve read about did this.
We do know, on the other hand, that many of the great American fortunes of the time were made in this business, by northerners who stayed in the U.S. their whole lives.
I say you have recognized only “the possibility” that the southern slave economy in fact benefited the North and the USA as a whole, but there is NO PROOF of that occurrence still providing a benefit today.
I think these are two separate issues, bobbo.
In terms of whether the southern slave economy benefited the North and the U.S. back then, that’s a slam-dunk. Much of the northern economy was dependent on the slave economy. You can’t devote most of your economy to financing and maritime activities around slavery, and to industrial activity dependent on slavery, without profiting hugely from slavery.
In terms of benefit today, I don’t think “proof” is the right way to look at it. Can we even conceive of an alternate pathway to our present standard of living? Can you suggest one, even hypothetically? Has any nation in history pulled that off, without having other advantages the U.S. hasn’t enjoyed? (Like Great Britain, getting to go first, or the Asian nations enjoying conditions in the late 20th century that never existed for the U.S.)
Too often Horowitz is a bit nutty for my tastes although I relate to his underdog status?
I’m with bobbo here. I think Horowitz is a bit nutty, but he raises some excellent objections to reparations (although focusing on an old version of the idea, so some of his arguments aren’t relevant anymore).
James–to restate my last post, and Horowitz not withstanding–assuming there was a benefit to America because of Slave Labor==how long will the benefit last so as to justify reparations?
Again, I think that’s two questions.
In terms of how long the benefits of the early U.S. economic successes will last, how long will the U.S. exist? How long will its economic strength be largely based on the foundation created by the colonial and early U.S. economic developments, and not by, say, a complete revamping of the world economic order that gives all nations a shot at economic success without regard to their past histories?
In terms of the second part, however, none of this necessarily justifies reparations.
doesn’t the complexity/chaos/variability/pros and cons of “life” make reparations a theoretical issue for maybe the affected generation plus 25 years and thats about it?
In many cases, I do think that length of time is enough to effectively wipe out harm to an affected group. Think of, say, Irish immigrants in the 19th century, or Indian immigrants in the 20th or 21st century. They faced discrimination and disadvantage, but before long were able to take advantage of many opportunities and find discrimination rapidly disappearing.
In the case of black Americans, however, slavery was followed by a century of brutal, widespread discrimination which has only gradually been disappearing in the last 40 years. We can show that black American families have never been given the chance to fully recover from these historical experiences (in fact, socioeconomic progress has been slight), while Irish-Americans do not bear the signs of the past in this way.
state the measurement of the reparations due? What were they in 1869 and what are they today?
I don’t believe that any reparations are due, bobbo.
If you want to measure the harm suffered by black Americans today due to our history of slavery and discrimination, I suppose you could go about it in one of two ways: either calculate what their families should have had in 1865 (say, reasonable compensation for slavery) and what they should have been able to accumulate over time without discrimination; or look at the disparity today between whites and blacks.
This doesn’t mean that reparations are due, of course, and if they are, what measure is appropriate. I’m just trying to suggest ways to estimate the harm done, since that seems to be what you’re asking. This is also different from the benefits derived by other Americans from that history, which is mostly what we’ve been talking about here, but presumably wouldn’t be the right measure of any reparations.
Has it been declining over time (I assume with no basis?) or have they in fact somehow compounded over the years?
I would think that any reparations amount has been declining very gradually over time, since we know that black citizens have been very, very gradually closing the racial inequality gap with whites.
are there any other examples of justified reparations due to ancestors of those who were directly wronged?
Well, presumably reparations were justified for the descendants of Japanese-Americans interned in concentration camps by the U.S. during WWII, since President Reagan and Congress gave them $1.6 billion in reparations.
I would think that there might be other such examples, but I can’t think of any off the top of my head. And, again, I’m not arguing that any reparations are due for slavery and discrimination.
I think it’s also important to note that most advocates of reparations for slavery and discrimination don’t want compensation for harm done to their ancestors. They want something to be done about the harm suffered by Americans today as a result of that history, which I think is quite different, at least in principle. Few of us would even think about paying someone today for the suffering of people centuries ago, but any harm endured by our fellow citizens today is at least something worth talking about.
James–I think adding the continuing discrimination as the main basis for reparations today is a stronger argument than reparations for the earlier slavery. If the Johnson Great Society Welfare Program that gave money to poor people (disproportionately black) had been called “An Act of Reparations to the Ancestors of Former Slaves Who Still Need Help” why would that not fill the bill? We certainly don’t let “names” control analysis do we?
The Japanese reparations were to those directly affected or their kiddies==not the example requested. Any Reparations older than that? Any other groups that might qualify?
I think adding the continuing discrimination as the main basis for reparations today is a stronger argument than reparations for the earlier slavery.
I agree, bobbo, which is why I’m glad to see more and more people focusing on the legacy of slavery today, rather than simply on the sins of the past.
why would that not fill the bill?
If you’re suggesting that the Great Society programs of the 1960s were reparations, under another name, then we disagree about that. Those programs benefited whites more than blacks, for instance, and did little to address the legacy of slavery and discrimination for modern black families.
The Japanese reparations were to those directly affected or their kiddies==not the example requested.
I realize you don’t think that example is pertinent enough, bobbo, but it does involve reparations paid to the victims’ descendants, as requested. I’m not sure whether that particular scheme (victims are paid, if alive; otherwise, the money goes to their recent descendants) is significantly different from the one which would apply to blacks (victims aren’t alive, so the money goes to their distant descendants).
Any Reparations older than that? Any other groups that might qualify?
Hmm. I’ve never really thought much about other examples of reparations; as I’ve said, I’m not much for that whole concept.
Alfred Brophy, in his book Reparations Pro & Con (2006), lists twenty-seven examples of reparations proposals, not all of which resulted in payments.
For instance, Massachusetts paid £20 for each person unjustly prosecuted as a witch in Salem in the 18th century. The money was paid to the families of the victims.
Illinois paid up to $5,000 per person and family member to victims and their families, for mob violence in the late 1800s and early 1900s.
And, of course, this fall it was announced that many of the Mexican braceros (guest workers) in the U.S. in WWII would be paid $3,500 each, and where dead, their descendants would receive the money.
Included in Brophy’s list are other groups which haven’t received reparations, but for which claims have been made.
James==You say: “If you’re suggesting that the Great Society programs of the 1960s were reparations, under another name, then we disagree about that. Those programs benefited whites more than blacks, for instance, and did little to address the legacy of slavery and discrimination for modern black families.” /// Well, I said blacks were “disproportionately benefitted” by Welfare programs. It was always said at the time that “More whites than blacks benefitted from AFWDC programs and the response was always that that was true in raw numbers but that blacks were 10-12 % of the population but received 30-35% of the welfare.”
Lets “assume” the latter statistics. Why would such a program not be reparations whether it was called that or not and whether it was even intended for that purpose or not? Must reparations be paid to multi-millionaire blacks of today?
We need to be strict about what reparations mean? I don’t think anyone complains about the victims of specific government harm getting a fraction of their damages back is wrong–or their kiddies who sue/represent on their behalf. We also aren’t talking about reparations for unjust conditions to be paid to unrelated people 150 years later. I thought we were talking about reparations for specific benefits that were still being received today?===or how would you define what we should focus on? And in all cases==again==how do we measure it?
Have you seen “The Curse of the Lottery?”–seems most people’s lives go into the shitter after they win a pot load of money they didn’t “earn.” Is that what you want?
Why would such a program not be reparations whether it was called that or not and whether it was even intended for that purpose or not?
Because any program which benefits primarily whites, and which does little to redress the lingering consequences of slavery and discrimination today, simply can’t be reparations for the latter history, by anyone’s definition. Can it?
I’m not necessarily criticizing those programs, and I’m certainly not arguing for race-based programs. I’m just saying that reparations would have to address the legacy which those reparations are intended to address (almost a tautology, isn’t it?).
I thought we were talking about reparations for specific benefits that were still being received today?===or how would you define what we should focus on?
I would think that reparations would need to focus on specific harm experienced today, with benefits enjoyed today being used to help justify reparations.
And in all cases==again==how do we measure it?
How do we measure the benefit? Or the harm?
I think, personally, that reparations would need to be calibrated in terms of the harm, not the benefit. Measuring harm could probably best be done by measuring racial inequities, which has been done extensively. Did you want to get into the various types of racial inequality in our country, and how to quantify each one? We could certainly do that, if you’d like.
But I don’t think reparations could or should aim at eliminating the harm, so I’m not personally worried about the measurement of it.
Is that what you want?
Do I want people’s lives to fall apart after they win the lottery, or are granted reparations? No, I don’t — but then, I’m not in favor of lotteries or reparations, either.
I’m not sure it’s fair, though, to refer to measures to compensate people for unjust harm they’ve suffered as “money they didn’t earn.” They may not have earned it, but almost by definition they’re entitled to it, and receiving it merely grants them what other people already have. Or something’s gone horribly, horribly wrong.
91–James==we are talking past each other. That happens when two people don’t connect on the point being made, or the point is made and understood and one or more people want to avoid the consequences of the point in a dishonest way.
I have said twice now that the Great Society Program disproportionately benefited blacks and NOT WHITES. You have said three times now that those programs disproportionately benefited whites.
Now, do you disagree about the impact of the program or what? If you disagree, I will google for a cite. If you agree, then why wouldn’t such programs be a form of reparations whether or not they were intended to be for that purpose or a more general one?
Logically–if the harm caused by slavery and its continuing discrimination was to leave blacks disadvantaged in income and education and welfare was meant to help those who are disadvantaged in income and education, AND such programs disproportionately served the black community==how could that not be reparations?
91–James==actually, I said this before too (and maybe Horowitz did as well?), why wouldn’t any general welfare program that helped any disadvantaged person be reparations?
Poor whites (disproportionate or not) are helped because they need it. Their family history could be of many sorts like having roots in the coal mines of Kentucky or some gawd forsaken religious commune in Oklahoma. Blacks of course could find their disadvantages in the same situations and even perhaps more often because of slavery===but if they get help from society because of their disadvantage why isn’t that reparations? Why is it reparations only if it is called that and only if it is above and beyond what other disadvantaged groups get?
Do you sense any kind of “race to the bottom” going on here?
do you disagree about the impact of the program or what?
As far as your point that blacks have benefited disproportionately from several of the Great Society programs, I certainly agree.
If you agree, then why wouldn’t such programs be a form of reparations whether or not they were intended to be for that purpose or a more general one?
I’ve already explained this, bobbo, but I’ll try to elaborate briefly.
I didn’t think that anyone would believe that a program could constitute reparations if it helps the victims less than other people. Or if the program didn’t take care of more than a very small part of the harm to be repaired. Or if the program wasn’t even remotely intended to be, or considered to be, reparations, but merely helped many people for other reasons, a minority of whom happened to be (essentially be coincidence) victims of wrongs not considered by the program’s creators.
Now, if you disagree, that’s fine with me. I think it would simply mean that you understand the word “reparations” differently than I do. If so, then I’m fine with that.
why wouldn’t any general welfare program that helped any disadvantaged person be reparations?
Poor whites (disproportionate or not) are helped because they need it.
I think you may have answered your own question, bobbo, at least from the perspective of someone who thinks of the word “reparations” as I do.
If a program helps poor whites because they need help, for reasons not requiring reparations, then how could that program’s aid to blacks be reparations?
If the portion given to blacks were seen as repair of harm they suffer as a result of past wrongdoing, and the aid to whites is simply to help them because they need it, then aren’t blacks missing out? Or weren’t they entitled to this help anyway (at least if whites were receiving it)?
if they get help from society because of their disadvantage why isn’t that reparations? Why is it reparations only if it is called that and only if it is above and beyond what other disadvantaged groups get?
I’ve never suggested it’s only reparations if it’s called that.
I suppose if society were giving all disadvantaged people money, in amounts sufficient to make up for wrongs they suffered in the past, then that would be reparations for slavery, discrimination, and every other wrong in our history.
I don’t think that’s what’s happening here, though. Most of the poor or disadvantaged are being given money because they are in need, not because they necessarily suffered wrongs in the past. (Having family roots in Kentucky coal mines, for instance, wasn’t a wrong done to people, just a very hard way to make a living. Ditto living on a religious commune.) And blacks haven’t been given aid sufficient to repair the damage of the past; at best, their aid would be partial reparations, and not even that if it’s simply what any poor or disadvantaged American is being given.
Please bear in mind that I’m not advocating any of these programs or ideas.
#94==James–its not the most important point, but it should be an easy one to come to agreement on. We still aren’t connecting.
For the fourth time now you have said A is B, then later you discuss this issue as if A was not B. Now, you are chastising me for asking you to confirm that A is B WHILE you continue to actually discuss that A is not B.
Now that the math is out of the way:
Did Blacks benefit disproportionately from the Johnson era welfare programs or not? You say yes (para 2), then you discuss it by going opposite (para 5): “I didn’t think that anyone would believe that a program could constitute reparations if it helps the victims less than other people.”
So, I’m confused. How did welfare help blacks disproportionately yet still they were helped less?
I’m confused. How did welfare help blacks disproportionately yet still they were helped less?
I must not be writing very clearly today, bobbo.
When I say that the Great Society programs “help the victims less than other people,” I’m speaking in absolute terms, not relative. I’m not contradicting myself, because I agree blacks benefited disproportionately; I’m saying that by benefiting whites more than blacks in absolute terms, that’s an issue.
So, for instance, let’s say a program gives $10,000 to five victims of a particular wrongdoing, and $10,000,000 to a thousand non-victims. It’s benefiting non-victims more in absolute terms and victims more in relative terms (i.e., disproportionately).
Now, your question is, does that program amount to “reparations” for the victims?
I think it might, if the amount given to victims came anywhere close to repairing their loss, if it were intended to repair their loss (whether or not it was called “reparations”), and if the program gave to non-victims for some other reason.
However, the Great Society programs don’t meet those criteria. Most importantly, I think, the non-victims (whites) received money because they met certain standards for being citizens deserving help. Either blacks were receiving money for the same reason as whites, and so this money wasn’t for the different purpose of repairing the past, or they were receiving it for that purpose, and being discriminated against by not simply receiving it for the reasons whites did.
It’s as if we said that the U.S. would pay income tax refunds this year, to citizens owed refunds, by paying the same amount to all citizens, whether or not they were owed refunds. Those owed refunds get their money, but shouldn’t they be upset that they aren’t getting the same money as their fellow citizens? They get the same money, but theirs is to satisfy a separate debt the U.S. already owed them. That wouldn’t be right, would it?
Now, we know the truth. The Great Society programs weren’t intended to repair past harms for blacks, and as a bonus, give similar money to whites (and not blacks) for another reason. Those programs were intended to aid those who are disadvantaged, for whatever reason, equally regardless of race, and without any intention whatsoever of undoing the damage caused by the sins of the past.
My usual disclaimer: I don’t support reparations; I’m simply trying to respond to your questions aimed specifically at me.
I meant to say “ten thousand victims.” Bad math, sorry!
I meant to say “ten thousand non-victims,” not a thousand. Bad math, sorry!
James–I think we are making progress. Slower than I would like, but at least a forward motion?
I hope my epistemological pedantry does not put you wholly off–but we think/understand in words and when words are misapplied, the thinking goes wrong as well.
I’m chomping at the bit to get to the heart of our issue, but building blocks first.
You are misusing the concepts of disparate impact vis-a-vis absolute terms. Your example has compensation of $2000 to victims and $1000 to non victims. The victims have been disproportionately compensated/benefited. The concept of “absolute” is completely inapplicable to the relevant issue==making the victims whole. A better word/concept you are actually referring to is the “aggregate cost” of the two different groups. This aggregate cost/absolute cost is a measure affecting the payor of the benefit==not a measure of the worth/quality of the benefit/repair received by the two groups.
So, can we now agree that the welfare program disproportionately benefited blacks or not-without confusing the meaning of this with reference to other irrelevant issues? Note those other issues do have relevancy to other issues, just not the issue of benefits to this class of people.
You are misusing the concepts of disparate impact vis-a-vis absolute terms.
I don’t think so, but let’s see.
The concept of “absolute” is completely inapplicable to the relevant issue==making the victims whole.
That’s your opinion, bobbo.
I tried to explain that if we consider the payments to be making the victims whole–and in the case of the Great Society programs, even that wasn’t true–then the victims have, once again, been wronged.
For then non-victims are being given something that victims aren’t.
Or, if you believe they’re all being given the same thing, then the money is what everyone is entitled to as a citizen, and not for repair at all.
The only way out of this logic is if you believe that you can compensate someone for a wrong with money that they’re entitled to for another reason.
It’s as if you said, okay, a minority group in our society has been wronged, and has less money today as a result of it. So we’re going to compensate them for it–but we’re then going to give extra money to everyone else. The minority was compensated, but then put behind again through a clearly discriminatory action.
If you consider that to be, in some sense, reparations, then fine. It’s not my definition, and I don’t think it meets any dictionary definition I’ve ever seen. But that’s your prerogative.
A better word/concept you are actually referring to is the “aggregate cost” of the two different groups.
I said that the non-victims benefit more in absolute terms.
This is a perfectly proper use of that concept, regardless of any other way that you’d like to describe the situation.
can we now agree that the welfare program disproportionately benefited blacks or not-without confusing the meaning of this with reference to other irrelevant issues?
I have said, repeatedly, that the programs at issue have disproportionately benefited blacks. That’s not in dispute. We’re arguing over whether or not these programs could possibly have constituted “reparations,” regardless of how they were labeled.