Thread by @michaelharriot

I didn’t say “EVERY white person”

But I should have.

A thread

https://twitter.com/gbob21320095/status/1824257282676494690

He’s technically right - every white person didn’t get the GI Bill.

But that’s not how an economy works. And every white person benefitted from it.

First of all, the GI Bill wasn’t the only New Deal policy that helped build the whites-only communities that we now call the suburbs. Black Americans were excluded from MANY post-Depression New Deal polices.

For example, to stop forclosures, the Home Owners Loan Corporation refinanced a million homes between 1933 & 1936. EVERYONE was poor & unemployed (which is why the depression was “Great”) Credit reports didn’t exist yet, so there was no way to determine creditworthiness

The HOLC’s color coded maps ensured that govt backed loans were in neighborhoods that were exclusively white.

But “redlining” maps didn’t just affect the 1 million govt backed loans & the GI Bill, banks began redlining maps for it for ALL mortgages

Local governments —even in integrated Northern cities like Chicago —made it ILLEGAL to sell property to Black people.

Fun fact: the parents of “A Raisin in the Sun” playwright Lorraine Hansberry won the Supreme Court case that outlawed racial covenants

Realtors had to promise to keep Black ppl out of white neighborhoods.

I didn’t make that up. The National Association of Realtors admitted it…

In 2020.

Fun fact: the term “realtor” was invented to differentiate between members of their whites-only NAR & other estate agents

Even the whites who didn’t qualify for HOLC got New Deal jobs that helped them buy & refi

And since the loans were govt backed, banks had lower risks, lowering ALL interest rates

But it wasn’t just about homes. If you owned a home in a non-redlined area, whites could refinance their homes to start a business or pay for their kids’ college, or make other purchases

This was the beginning of the 2 car family, the small business explosion & the college boom

So many white kids went to college after WW2 that universities were packed to the gills. The higher education attainment & home values fueled their generational wealth, which built more homes and more business for whites, which exacerbated inequality

Because of redlining, the Black vets who received the GI bill couldn’t buy a home. Even Blacks who owned their homes couldn’t refinance

And because of segregation & high demand for HBCUs, Black vets couldn’t attend college.

But here’s the thing:

Those GI Bills were paid with tax dollars that Black citizens were also paying.

Those mortgages were backed with tax dollars that Black ppl also paid.

Black Americans paid for roads & schools in those whites only suburbs. They funded public colleges they couldn’t attend

If white Americans had to find those down payments and loans and jobs and mortgages and low interest loans by themselves, their taxes would have increased. Their public universities would have been worse.

Their neighborhoods would have been poorer and their kids less educated

I won’t even get into how segregation inflates property values that determine property taxes that influences school funding, public safety, municipal resources, water cleanliness, teacher pay, garbage collection, business subsides, neighborhood revitalization, sidewalks, parks…

They were essentially living off welfare

They lived in homes they couldn’t afford without our tax dollars and their kids attended schools that we funded. Their generational prosperity was funded on the backs of ppl who didn’t have access to their American dream

This economic prosperity had nothing to do with individual hate or work ethic or 2-parent homes or rap music or buying Jordans or faith in God

It was a white-approved national policy intentionally created to build & maintain the white middle class’ economic stability

But the architects of this economic policy didn’t just exclude Black people, they specifically crafted it with the intention to help AS MANY WHITE PEOPLE as possible.

“EVERY WHITE PERSON” WAS THE GOAL.

If your people missed out….

That says more about them than me