🔅 The $600 Billion Theft: How the U.S. Stole from Black Americans
Apple's Supply Chain Conundrum, and the Call for African Resource Control
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Spotlight Stories
The $600 Billion Theft: How the U.S. Stole from Black Americans
Brace yourselves for a jaw-dropping revelation in Andrew W. Kahrl's new book, "The Black Tax: 150 Years of Theft, Exploitation, and Dispossession in America." The professor of history and African American studies at the University of Virginia has put in extensive research to unravel how the U.S. stole $600 billion from Black Americans through a system of highly unjust municipal and state taxes.
The book is replete with statistics, studies, and personal stories that shed light on how racist laws and practices dating back to the Jim Crow era have cheated Black Americans out of land ownership and pushed them into poverty.
From the late 19th and early 20th centuries, unfair tactics were used to doubly disadvantage Black landowners by artificially inflating property value estimates for tax calculation, overcharging them for their land, and exploiting their inability to pay as a means to seize their properties.
One such example is the town of Edmonson, Arkansas:
It was established by two Black men, Anthony Fleming and J.R. Rooks, who were forced off their farmland by White supremacist mobs. However, 20 years later, the town was no more after white plantation owners plotted to seize the land by imposing taxes on lots the Edmonson residents were unaware of.
Kahrl doesn't just focus on the grim findings but also shares possible solutions to make up for the last century of financial oppression against the Black community. Like what? You can catch a glimpse of his suggestions here.
Apple's Conundrum: iPhones Tainted by Conflict Minerals?
The Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) has a bone to pick with Apple, and it's not about the latest iPhone's lack of a headphone jack. The DRC government has accused the tech giant of using illegally exported minerals from the country's war-torn east in its products, effectively making them "tainted by the blood of the Congolese people.”
Lawyers representing the DRC have penned a strongly worded letter to Apple CEO Tim Cook, questioning the company's claims of carefully verifying the origins of the materials used in its devices. The mineral-rich region in question, which borders Uganda and Rwanda, is currently a hotspot for conflict between government forces and the M23 rebel group, allegedly backed by Rwanda.
The DRC's lawyers allege that Apple relies on suppliers based in Rwanda and that the company's due diligence is about as solid as a house of cards.
Apple, for its part, has been touting its use of recycled materials and its goal of creating a "closed loop" supply chain. But the DRC isn't buying it. They want answers, and they want them now.
Africa Must Seize Control of Its Resources to Lift People from Poverty
Wanjira Mathai, a prominent African environmentalist, has called for the continent to take greater control of the industries it supplies with raw materials in order to lift its people out of poverty and shape its own destiny in a low-carbon world.
Mathai, the managing director for Africa and global partnerships at the World Resources Institute think tank, believes that much more of what Africa produces must be processed and utilized close to where it is produced to support the global shift to a low-carbon economy.
Africa's vast resources, spanning agriculture, forestry, fisheries, minerals, and metals, are crucial to the global economy.
However, most of these resources are extracted and processed elsewhere, often with serious environmental consequences and few economic and social benefits for Africans themselves.
Mathai argues that by moving up the value chain and processing more raw materials locally, African nations can generate much more income and create fairer, more equitable economies for small farmers and producers.
Transporting raw materials across the world is more carbon-intensive than transporting processed products, and Mathai believes that investing in green industrialization and renewable energy in Africa could encourage investors to site their industries near these abundant low-carbon power sources. If these investments are not made, she warns that Africans may turn to readily available fossil fuel finance instead.
Food for Thought
“If your only tool is a hammer, you will see every problem as a nail."
— Gambian Proverb