"A Cheap, Race-Neutral Way to Close the Racial Wealth Gap..

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:All this does is encourage people who can’t afford it to have lots of babies. I’m a moderate who hasn’t voted Republican in probably 20 years. Policy proposals like this are going to force people like me to move right.

Wow. Only if you are planning, before getting pregnant, to steal money from your adult children.

Which I am sure a lot of people will do.

Would you do this? Can you think of anyone you know who would do this?

All my SAHM friends who got divorced and their H got a hot new wife took their kids money and said it was 1/2 theirs.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:All this does is encourage people who can’t afford it to have lots of babies. I’m a moderate who hasn’t voted Republican in probably 20 years. Policy proposals like this are going to force people like me to move right.

Me too. Policies like this and the politics of Sanders, AOC, etc. really just drive me toward the right.

I voted democrat for 5 straight presidential elections (ever since I could vote). I suddenly realized this year that apparently I am not a democrat. Will sadly be voting Trump now. Sad! I'm not kidding.

It’s not uncommon for mental illness to hit midlife.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:All this does is encourage people who can’t afford it to have lots of babies. I’m a moderate who hasn’t voted Republican in probably 20 years. Policy proposals like this are going to force people like me to move right.

Wow. Only if you are planning, before getting pregnant, to steal money from your adult children.

Which I am sure a lot of people will do.

Would you do this? Can you think of anyone you know who would do this?

Yes, I know plenty of people it happened to. My friend's dad gambled away her college fund. My roommate's dad left them and spent most of her college money on his new wife.

Also, plenty of people (including many I know) use their kids' names to take out credit for stupid things.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:All this does is encourage people who can’t afford it to have lots of babies. I’m a moderate who hasn’t voted Republican in probably 20 years. Policy proposals like this are going to force people like me to move right.

Wow. Only if you are planning, before getting pregnant, to steal money from your adult children.

Which I am sure a lot of people will do.

Would you do this? Can you think of anyone you know who would do this?

Yes, I know plenty of people it happened to. My friend's dad gambled away her college fund. My roommate's dad left them and spent most of her college money on his new wife.

Also, plenty of people (including many I know) use their kids' names to take out credit for stupid things.

+1. DD has a friend whose parents borrowed under name.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:All this does is encourage people who can’t afford it to have lots of babies. I’m a moderate who hasn’t voted Republican in probably 20 years. Policy proposals like this are going to force people like me to move right.

Me too. Policies like this and the politics of Sanders, AOC, etc. really just drive me toward the right.

I voted democrat for 5 straight presidential elections (ever since I could vote). I suddenly realized this year that apparently I am not a democrat. Will sadly be voting Trump now. Sad! I'm not kidding.

Guys, step back a moment. This is a fringe idea. There are 2-3 people on DCUM pushing this and bumping this thread endlessly. And a couple of widely-published authors like Coates.

Most mainstream Dems are not behind cash handouts, or not large ones. Instead, most of the Democratic Party is for expanding Head Start, improving schools, maybe subsidizing colleges, maybe subsidizing home-ownership. Obama, for example, said he didn't support reparations in the form of cash handouts. Biden isn't going to go for cash handouts.

Are you going to let a few obsessive but fringy posters drive you to support Trump's criminal non-leadership on COVID, his criminally divisive tweets on race and everything else, the treasonous pass he tried to give to Russia for paying bounties for killing American soldiers, and so much more?

Its a fake post Don’t waste your time... only people jumping party this year are Republicans ... and a few independents.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:All this does is encourage people who can’t afford it to have lots of babies. I’m a moderate who hasn’t voted Republican in probably 20 years. Policy proposals like this are going to force people like me to move right.

Me too. Policies like this and the politics of Sanders, AOC, etc. really just drive me toward the right.

I voted democrat for 5 straight presidential elections (ever since I could vote). I suddenly realized this year that apparently I am not a democrat. Will sadly be voting Trump now. Sad! I'm not kidding.

Guys, step back a moment. This is a fringe idea. There are 2-3 people on DCUM pushing this and bumping this thread endlessly. And a couple of widely-published authors like Coates.

Most mainstream Dems are not behind cash handouts, or not large ones. Instead, most of the Democratic Party is for expanding Head Start, improving schools, maybe subsidizing colleges, maybe subsidizing home-ownership. Obama, for example, said he didn't support reparations in the form of cash handouts. Biden isn't going to go for cash handouts.

Are you going to let a few obsessive but fringy posters drive you to support Trump's criminal non-leadership on COVID, his criminally divisive tweets on race and everything else, the treasonous pass he tried to give to Russia for paying bounties for killing American soldiers, and so much more?

Its a fake post Don’t waste your time... only people jumping party this year are Republicans ... and a few independents.

PP here. Yep, you're probably right. Desperate Cons are trying to make reparations a wedge issue.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:All this does is encourage people who can’t afford it to have lots of babies. I’m a moderate who hasn’t voted Republican in probably 20 years. Policy proposals like this are going to force people like me to move right.

Me too. Policies like this and the politics of Sanders, AOC, etc. really just drive me toward the right.

I voted democrat for 5 straight presidential elections (ever since I could vote). I suddenly realized this year that apparently I am not a democrat. Will sadly be voting Trump now. Sad! I'm not kidding.

Guys, step back a moment. This is a fringe idea. There are 2-3 people on DCUM pushing this and bumping this thread endlessly. And a couple of widely-published authors like Coates.

Most mainstream Dems are not behind cash handouts, or not large ones. Instead, most of the Democratic Party is for expanding Head Start, improving schools, maybe subsidizing colleges, maybe subsidizing home-ownership. Obama, for example, said he didn't support reparations in the form of cash handouts. Biden isn't going to go for cash handouts.

Are you going to let a few obsessive but fringy posters drive you to support Trump's criminal non-leadership on COVID, his criminally divisive tweets on race and everything else, the treasonous pass he tried to give to Russia for paying bounties for killing American soldiers, and so much more?

OP here. I am really not endlessly posting about this. I saw this article in The Atlantic, it made me think of the poor Appalachian teenagers/foster kids that I work with, and I wondered what people thought of it.

I don’t really see anywhere that this is being seriously discussed as policy. I also didn’t connect it with reparations, although I can see how you got there.

I have found some parts of this discussion very interesting, and I appreciate it, but there is no reason it should change the way you vote.

[Anonymous]

I just wish one supporter of one-time cash handouts would explain why this is better than spending the same money to effect long-term change in all the systemic barriers that keep black kids in bad schools with hopeless job prospects.

I know I sound like a broken record because I've asked this several times.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:All this does is encourage people who can’t afford it to have lots of babies. I’m a moderate who hasn’t voted Republican in probably 20 years. Policy proposals like this are going to force people like me to move right.

Me too. Policies like this and the politics of Sanders, AOC, etc. really just drive me toward the right.

I voted democrat for 5 straight presidential elections (ever since I could vote). I suddenly realized this year that apparently I am not a democrat. Will sadly be voting Trump now. Sad! I'm not kidding.

It’s not uncommon for mental illness to hit midlife.

I’m not the poster you’re insulting, but this type of rhetoric and the increasing intolerance for differing views also makes me lean right (and I have not I only voted D but put significant money where my mouth is over the years). I hate Trump but don’t feel like I belong in the Democratic Party these days either. These types of ideas and the liberal elitism of statements like “if you don’t think like me, you’re mentally ill,” is how Trump got elected in the first place. Keep it up and you’ll ensure he’ll be re-elected!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Instead of handouts with no stated goal, which just invite corruption, the investment should be made in:
1. K-12 support for kids so they are actually college-ready. and 2. If they are college ready, support for attending four year schools and 3. systems that incentivize successful graduates to give back to their communities

One great example of this is LeBron James' work in Akron with K-12 kids to prep them for college and full scholarships to four year schools (Kent State, U of Akron) to kids in the program who *actually* meet admissions criteria for those schools.

A bigger scale government program is Georgia's HOPE program which is funded by lottery funds and has two aims: 1. allow poor kids to attend school either full or part time (it started with an income cap but no longer has one) and 2. prevent a brain drain out of Georgia by incentivizing kids who could leave the state (scholarships or full pay) to stay in the state.

I'd definitely support a federal version of these programs, instead of handouts.

HOPE also extends to vocational school/technical school (not just four year schools) which play a huge role in reducing poverty.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I just wish one supporter of one-time cash handouts would explain why this is better than spending the same money to effect long-term change in all the systemic barriers that keep black kids in bad schools with hopeless job prospects.

I know I sound like a broken record because I've asked this several times.

I have answered this, as have a social worker and a teacher earlier in this thread. I’m a psychiatrist, not an economist, so my thoughts are colored in that direction.
But what I see when I talk to kids about their hopes and dreams is that they are extremely limited. I think that if kids grew up knowing that they had $$ to spend to improve their lives, they would start thinking about how to use it and see more possibilities for themselves.

I don’t know how much you know about structural scaffolding in education. The idea is that you start with the basics of a concept, then you continue to build on that information. This is a formal concept that takes advantage of the way our minds naturally work. Once we have scaffolding, then we will start to hook new information to it and build a more fully formed understanding. For example, when you get pregnant, you start learning about pregnancy, and you start noticing that there is information about pregnancy all around you. It was always there, but it just slid away from you before. Or when you first start reading Ancient Greek tragedies in school, you suddenly start noticing references to them. Again, the references were always there. You just didn’t pick up on it before.

I think for many kids that growing up with this money would provide a kind of scaffolding. Information about ACT exams, college applications, home ownership, small business ownership, etc. wouldn’t just slide away. It would have a place to stick.

Now, are there a number of kids who are never going to get there? Yes. Are there some bad parents out there who will try to steal the money? Yes. Are there kids out there who were born looking for ways to succeed and don’t need it? Of course. But for a lot of kids, I can see how this would be very helpful in a way that throwing money at the schools or neighborhood programs would not.

I mean, imagine what kind of discussions teenagers might have about what they are going to do after high school if everyone there has $60k in a bank account. It might look an awful lot more like the discussions middle class kids have.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I just wish one supporter of one-time cash handouts would explain why this is better than spending the same money to effect long-term change in all the systemic barriers that keep black kids in bad schools with hopeless job prospects.

I know I sound like a broken record because I've asked this several times.

I have answered this, as have a social worker and a teacher earlier in this thread. I’m a psychiatrist, not an economist, so my thoughts are colored in that direction.
But what I see when I talk to kids about their hopes and dreams is that they are extremely limited. I think that if kids grew up knowing that they had $$ to spend to improve their lives, they would start thinking about how to use it and see more possibilities for themselves.

I don’t know how much you know about structural scaffolding in education. The idea is that you start with the basics of a concept, then you continue to build on that information. This is a formal concept that takes advantage of the way our minds naturally work. Once we have scaffolding, then we will start to hook new information to it and build a more fully formed understanding. For example, when you get pregnant, you start learning about pregnancy, and you start noticing that there is information about pregnancy all around you. It was always there, but it just slid away from you before. Or when you first start reading Ancient Greek tragedies in school, you suddenly start noticing references to them. Again, the references were always there. You just didn’t pick up on it before.

I think for many kids that growing up with this money would provide a kind of scaffolding. Information about ACT exams, college applications, home ownership, small business ownership, etc. wouldn’t just slide away. It would have a place to stick.

Now, are there a number of kids who are never going to get there? Yes. Are there some bad parents out there who will try to steal the money? Yes. Are there kids out there who were born looking for ways to succeed and don’t need it? Of course. But for a lot of kids, I can see how this would be very helpful in a way that throwing money at the schools or neighborhood programs would not.

I mean, imagine what kind of discussions teenagers might have about what they are going to do after high school if everyone there has $60k in a bank account. It might look an awful lot more like the discussions middle class kids have.

Thanks for this. I guess my point is, I don't see how this would be more useful than using the same money to reform early, elementary, and secondary education. And then offering college tuition support in the form of grants administered by the colleges, instead of as a handout to a kid. That way, people couldn't blow it or have their parents steal it. I also feel like, if schools don't prepare kids to succeed in college, then what are we doing but setting kids up for failure.

I suppose that telling a kid "here's $50K, but you can only use it for college" is different from, and might be more motivational than, "if you go to college, you'll get some part of tuition for free." It's the difference between knowing you own your 401(k) and the promise that you might get Social Security. But again, $50K will get you two years at UMD, and not even a full year at Columbia. So now we're saying, we'll give you half the tuition, and you might get a scholarship, but you might have to borrow the rest.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I just wish one supporter of one-time cash handouts would explain why this is better than spending the same money to effect long-term change in all the systemic barriers that keep black kids in bad schools with hopeless job prospects.

I know I sound like a broken record because I've asked this several times.

I have answered this, as have a social worker and a teacher earlier in this thread. I’m a psychiatrist, not an economist, so my thoughts are colored in that direction.
But what I see when I talk to kids about their hopes and dreams is that they are extremely limited. I think that if kids grew up knowing that they had $$ to spend to improve their lives, they would start thinking about how to use it and see more possibilities for themselves.

I don’t know how much you know about structural scaffolding in education. The idea is that you start with the basics of a concept, then you continue to build on that information. This is a formal concept that takes advantage of the way our minds naturally work. Once we have scaffolding, then we will start to hook new information to it and build a more fully formed understanding. For example, when you get pregnant, you start learning about pregnancy, and you start noticing that there is information about pregnancy all around you. It was always there, but it just slid away from you before. Or when you first start reading Ancient Greek tragedies in school, you suddenly start noticing references to them. Again, the references were always there. You just didn’t pick up on it before.

I think for many kids that growing up with this money would provide a kind of scaffolding. Information about ACT exams, college applications, home ownership, small business ownership, etc. wouldn’t just slide away. It would have a place to stick.

Now, are there a number of kids who are never going to get there? Yes. Are there some bad parents out there who will try to steal the money? Yes. Are there kids out there who were born looking for ways to succeed and don’t need it? Of course. But for a lot of kids, I can see how this would be very helpful in a way that throwing money at the schools or neighborhood programs would not.

I mean, imagine what kind of discussions teenagers might have about what they are going to do after high school if everyone there has $60k in a bank account. It might look an awful lot more like the discussions middle class kids have.

Thanks for this. I guess my point is, I don't see how this would be more useful than using the same money to reform early, elementary, and secondary education. And then offering college tuition support in the form of grants administered by the colleges, instead of as a handout to a kid. That way, people couldn't blow it or have their parents steal it. I also feel like, if schools don't prepare kids to succeed in college, then what are we doing but setting kids up for failure.

I suppose that telling a kid "here's $50K, but you can only use it for college" is different from, and might be more motivational than, "if you go to college, you'll get some part of tuition for free." It's the difference between knowing you own your 401(k) and the promise that you might get Social Security. But again, $50K will get you two years at UMD, and not even a full year at Columbia. So now we're saying, we'll give you half the tuition, and you might get a scholarship, but you might have to borrow the rest.

Pp here.
A lot of poor kids don’t really grow up thinking about college, and it can seem kind of unreachable. They often don’t hear about scholarships until their senior year, and at that point it just seems so out of reach.

I think offering a college scholarship is kind of like telling you “I will pay all of your living expenses for the next year if you use that year to write a novel,” when you have never written a novel or known anyone who has written one. Of course people do it all of the time, but would you? Do you see how intimidating that is?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:At some point that community is going to stop looking for different forms of government handouts (of which the current push for reparations is just the latest iteration) and rely upon the same tools of hard work and self-reliance that every other group in American society does to improve their economic fortunes.

Of course, if lazy black people would just stop being lazy and work for something , I mean really it’s ridiculous. Who cares if more white people get government assistance and that white women are the primary recipients of affirmative action, facts don’t matter. Black people don’t work, they don’t care about education and they are all just crying victim. I believe it so it must be true!!
Hey, I get it, you are tired from being slaves, but that was hundreds of years ago so get off your duff, move out of that crime ridden Chicago, stop doing drugs, leave that to those other folks getting help with their opioid addictions, leave the rehabs and medical programs for them gosh darn it.
We’re tired of your bit chin’, I’ve got a war against masks to wage, we don’t have time for that BLM crap. MASKS DON’T MATTER, but I digress.
The only thing that matters here is that they just grab those boot straps and get to work.!!!!

No, you're distorting positions. The racist turds saying "get a job" aside, lots of people here want to help break down the causes of systemic racism. They are willing to be taxed more to do it.

They just don't agree that cash handouts are the way to do this, as opposed to school reform, subsidizing college, maybe subsidizing homeownership, and healthcare reform. And even as people give reasons why they don't think cash handouts would eliminate wealth inequalities, you haven't bothered to explain how cash handouts would work better.

Are you paying attention ? Did you read what this was a response to ?? I was not responding to a nuanced, fact based discussion on the feasibility of cash handouts. Thank you very much.

So you have no substantive response to PP? Just admit you want money in your pocket that you did nothing to earn.

Dumb a** I never said I was pro-cash handouts. I am
Just anti-a** hole therefore my response to the racist tripe.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I just wish one supporter of one-time cash handouts would explain why this is better than spending the same money to effect long-term change in all the systemic barriers that keep black kids in bad schools with hopeless job prospects.

I know I sound like a broken record because I've asked this several times.

I have answered this, as have a social worker and a teacher earlier in this thread. I’m a psychiatrist, not an economist, so my thoughts are colored in that direction.
But what I see when I talk to kids about their hopes and dreams is that they are extremely limited. I think that if kids grew up knowing that they had $$ to spend to improve their lives, they would start thinking about how to use it and see more possibilities for themselves.

I don’t know how much you know about structural scaffolding in education. The idea is that you start with the basics of a concept, then you continue to build on that information. This is a formal concept that takes advantage of the way our minds naturally work. Once we have scaffolding, then we will start to hook new information to it and build a more fully formed understanding. For example, when you get pregnant, you start learning about pregnancy, and you start noticing that there is information about pregnancy all around you. It was always there, but it just slid away from you before. Or when you first start reading Ancient Greek tragedies in school, you suddenly start noticing references to them. Again, the references were always there. You just didn’t pick up on it before.

I think for many kids that growing up with this money would provide a kind of scaffolding. Information about ACT exams, college applications, home ownership, small business ownership, etc. wouldn’t just slide away. It would have a place to stick.

Now, are there a number of kids who are never going to get there? Yes. Are there some bad parents out there who will try to steal the money? Yes. Are there kids out there who were born looking for ways to succeed and don’t need it? Of course. But for a lot of kids, I can see how this would be very helpful in a way that throwing money at the schools or neighborhood programs would not.

I mean, imagine what kind of discussions teenagers might have about what they are going to do after high school if everyone there has $60k in a bank account. It might look an awful lot more like the discussions middle class kids have.

Thanks for this. I guess my point is, I don't see how this would be more useful than using the same money to reform early, elementary, and secondary education. And then offering college tuition support in the form of grants administered by the colleges, instead of as a handout to a kid. That way, people couldn't blow it or have their parents steal it. I also feel like, if schools don't prepare kids to succeed in college, then what are we doing but setting kids up for failure.

I suppose that telling a kid "here's $50K, but you can only use it for college" is different from, and might be more motivational than, "if you go to college, you'll get some part of tuition for free." It's the difference between knowing you own your 401(k) and the promise that you might get Social Security. But again, $50K will get you two years at UMD, and not even a full year at Columbia. So now we're saying, we'll give you half the tuition, and you might get a scholarship, but you might have to borrow the rest.

Pp here.
A lot of poor kids don’t really grow up thinking about college, and it can seem kind of unreachable. They often don’t hear about scholarships until their senior year, and at that point it just seems so out of reach.

I think offering a college scholarship is kind of like telling you “I will pay all of your living expenses for the next year if you use that year to write a novel,” when you have never written a novel or known anyone who has written one. Of course people do it all of the time, but would you? Do you see how intimidating that is?

Also, if the high school does nothing to prepare them for college (or vocational training) from an academic standpoint and you give them 50k to spend on college, they probably won't get far in college or will end up pursuing some passion certificate from a diploma mill.