Thread by @ZachWLambert

Y’all remember Hoarders?

That show about people hoarding food, clothes, dolls, even animals.

We rightly see someone with 200 rabbits in their apartment and think, “they have a problem.”

So here’s my question: Why don’t we look at people who hoard wealth the same way?

Thread:

Why are hoarders of money applauded while hoarders of newspapers are condemned?

Because we live in a culture where consumption and greed are not just tolerated, they are celebrated.

But hoarding doesn’t just hurt the hoarder, it hurts everyone caught in their wake as well.

While hoarding may lead to earthly wealth for some, it leads to poverty and oppression for many others.

When someone gives into the scarcity mindset, it always ends up leaving other people without their basic needs met.

Let me give you an example…

In 1934, the Federal Housing Administration (FHA) was established as a part of the New Deal under FDR during the Great Depression.

It was created in order to make housing and home mortgages more affordable for Americans.

Well, for some Americans at least...

In 1935, the FHA asked the Home Owners Loan Cooperation (HOLC) to survey 239 US cities and create something called “residential security maps” in order to predict where federal loans would have the greatest return on investment.

But the HOLC didn’t just predict outcomes, they actively influenced them through a process called redlining.

Redlining separated these 239 cities into four zones through a grading system.

Green = “Best”
Blue = “Still Desirable”
Yellow =“Definitely Declining”
Red = “Hazardous”

But there was a HUGE problem...

The vast majority of areas receiving the “declining” and “hazardous” grades were made up of racial minorities - mostly Black and Hispanic/Latino.

While the areas receiving the “still desirable” and “best” grades were almost exclusively white.

Richmond University in Virginia has compiled all the original “residential security maps” through a project called Mapping Inequality and turned them into an interactive website.

dsl.richmond.edu/panorama/redli…

One of the 239 cities that got redlined was my city, Austin, Texas.

It wasn’t just that these redlined areas didn’t get any federal funding.

These maps actually became FHA standards for giving out any kind of loans, meaning lenders couldn’t get FHA insurance on their loans if they invested in redlined communities.

For decades, this led to both public and private entities denying loans for individuals, businesses, and even non-profits in Black and Hispanic/Latino neighborhoods.

You might be thinking, “Now hold on, Zach. How do you know FOR SURE that redlining was about race?"

Well, the official FHA appraisal manuals distributed during this time came with specific instructions for banks to stay away from red-lined areas because they were filled with, “inharmonious racial groups.”

From 1934 and 1962, a time when many white families including my grandparents were purchasing homes and building wealth, $120 billion of new housing was subsidized by the government.

Do you know how much of that went to nonwhite Americans? Less than 2%.

pbs.org/race/000_About…

The practice of denying loans to people based on their race continued for decades and was not made illegal until the Equal Credit Opportunity Act became law in 1974.

Instead of looking out at folks suffering through the Great Depression and thinking, “how can we help uplift ALL Americans?”

The federal government thought, “how can we help people who look like us and make sure we get the most money possible in return?”

So at the height of segregation and Jim Crow, an all-white federal government decided to only give money to white families and white communities, believing that would yield the best return.

Then they told lending organizations not to give loans to people in communities of color.

You might be thinking, “Now hold on, Zach. How do you know the people making these decisions were white?”

Because we have history books (for now, at least).

Did you know the first Black cabinet member took office in 1966 and the first Latino cabinet member took office in 1988?

The Great Depression was horrific. Most historians and economic experts agree the New Deal was vital for lifting us out of it.

But who is “us”?

Because although many Americans greatly benefited from the New Deal, racial minorities were largely excluded from it.

These actions remain one of the most egregious examples of hoarding in our country’s history and we are still feeling the effects.

This hoarding based on race and class has led to massive wealth gaps which are still getting worse today.

For instance…

In 2016, due to the ongoing devaluation of property in historically redlined areas, predominantly white school districts received $23 billion more in state and local funding than predominantly nonwhite school districts.

washingtonpost.com/local/educatio…

Black, Hispanic, and Latino families have around 12% of the wealth that white families do, about $150,000 less on average.

The 400 richest Americans have more total wealth than ALL Black American households combined.

brookings.edu/research/closi…
federalreserve.gov/econres/notes/…

I could go on and on, but I’ll end with this one:

- The median wealth level for a white family with kids is $63,838.
- Hispanic and Latino families with kids is $3175.
- And a Black family with kids is $808.

theguardian.com/inequality/202…

I hope this goes without saying, but none of these stats are caused by the "inferiority" of a race or ethnicity.

Racial wealth gaps exist because of practices and policies of hoarding.

Everyone should care about this, but if you’re a Christian, you should REALLY care about it.

Because our God HATES hoarding.

From the opening pages of Genesis to the end of Revelation and everywhere in between, God calls us to only take what we need.

Why does God hate hoarding so much?

Because when someone takes more than they need, others are left with not enough.

When one person hoards, another person goes without.

We must diligently work to break this cycle. This means intentionally divest from the consumeristic society in which we live.

If we don't, our natural consumption and this materialistic world will make these decisions for us.

So let’s do it.

1. Let’s stop hoarding and consuming, because it only hurts us and our neighbors.

2. Let’s only take what we need.

3. And then let’s give any extra we have to folks who don’t have enough.