I have to share these two paragraphs from Bill Bonner’s Bonner Private Research today.
“One of the most curious public policy ideas in America today is providing compensation to groups of people for injuries suffered by their ancestors. It sounds reasonable until you realize that the ‘reparation’ payments must come from the living, who had no part in the wrongdoing, and go to other living people, who did not suffer from them.
A ‘reparations’ payment would raise GDP…as a part of government spending…but actually reduce real wealth, like a swindle, by taking money from the people who earned it and giving it to people who didn’t. And then you have the challenge of deciding which groups, historically, suffered the most…and which other groups, today, should pay for it.”
An increase in GDP does not necessarily mean our economy is really growing.
You can think of it as another rob from Peter to pay Paul so Judas (politicians) score points (donations and votes) from Paul scheme.
My grandfather's grandfather was the son of a slave woman and an unknown father. Based on what our family has learned, his father was likely her White owner, and we don't know how she left his control. Apparently the Underground Railroad got mother and son to Michigan, where records are better established. After several generations that included German-origin brides (my grandfather matriculated at the University of Michigan, but did not graduate). I grew up in White culture, but if reparations become a thing, my brothers and I are 1/16 Black, so should be entitled to go to the front of the line, shouldn't we?