Completely agree. Most racism in the USA can be explained by poverty—of which "POC" are disproportionately represented. America's systemic racism is better described as systemic poverty combined abuse of the poor.
Yes, but the problems are interwoven. Poverty amplifies the problem of racism. But racism is what caused that poverty in the first place.
Now I do believe that more social democratic policies would benefit African-Americans a lot. But it would not completely eradicate the problems of racism and they would still be worse off than white.
The problem with only tackling racism and not inequality and poverty is that, even if you removed racism completely, African-Americans would still be stuck with being poor, simply for historical reasons.
Just like poor white people are likely to have kids which are poor.
> Poverty amplifies the problem of racism. But racism is what caused that poverty in the first place.
I partly agree, but I’d argue that it’s less complicated. I would rephrase thusly: Poverty IS the problem. And historical racism is the cause of a lot of that poverty.
> even if you removed racism completely, African-Americans would still be stuck with being poor, simply for historical reasons.
I agree in principle. The question is how you solve for systemic poverty. I think the first, most obvious step is to enact a very steep inheritance tax. That would be the most effective way to dampen generational capital inequality.
The second thing you could do is a generous UBI because that would dramatically benefit the systemically poor. The most effective way to lower income inequality is to raise the floor.
