I was recently reading an article pertaining to the “Black Wall Street” and I came to the conclusion that it would be extremely difficult to repeat the success seen long ago, but not impossible. A situation similar to that would be great for Black Americans, but Black Americans don't own enough commercial real estate in our neighborhoods to keep the majority of our income in the Black Community.
Does that mean that we are stuck in a never ending cycle of giving away 80 cents of every dollar that we spend? No it doesn't. It just means that we need to start focusing on the big picture and cutting that amount down as much as we possibly can. Although, we don't own most of our neighborhoods, we can support the businesses that were established for us & by us.
By supporting one another, we are contributing to the growth and development of businesses that were created by people who can truly relate to our needs. This can be done by supporting your neighborhood businesses, civic organizations, media, publications, and online businesses.
Small but continuous steps are needed to bring us closer to self-sufficiency and are necessary to build the type of financial foundation that will be needed for us to continue to grow as a people. Challenge yourself and those close to you to spend 20 cents of each disposable dollar you earn in your community and 5 cents of each of those dollars to support another Black American owned business or organization for this entire month. If these amounts are increased by 1 cent every other month, you will be supporting black businesses with 37% of your usable income in the 1st year alone and 49% in the 2nd year. This might sound simple, but the goal is to continue to increase that amount at a slow and steady pace so that foundations can be be built by and for our people.
Do you have 25 cents?
Posted By: Emmanuel Brown
Friday, September 5th 2008 at 11:28PM
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