we've got to talk more about how the refusal to acknowledge white supremacy and its history – the way it is woven into all of our systems – is destroys our ability to design effective policy, especially right now. 1/

i see it every day. wonks and "thought leaders" want to solve all these problems – slow productivity growth, astronomical inequality, lagging competitiveness – but don't want to acknowledge the role that maintaining whiteness has played in creating them. 2/

i wish that we could comb through all of the federal economic policy we have and just point out all of the places where we sacrificed efficiency + effectiveness to protect white wealth + power. because it happens ALL THE TIME. 3/

the unemployment systems that were built to keep people from filing claims and are now kneecapping our ability to effectively respond to the recession? created to lock out "undeserving" POC, largely to keep them available as low-wage workers. 4/

the dismantling of the cash welfare system we now need? rolled back under the guise that welfare queens and other "bad" black people would take advantage of it. (AKA women who would otherwise do domestic labor would now be able to stay home and care for their own kids.) 5/

the paycheck protection plan Congress passed in the CARES Act? won't reach people of color because it relies on banks + financial institutions that have long histories of being legally allowed to exclude + disadvantage POC. 6/

growing rates of male unemployment? i'm sure it has nothing thing to do with the explosion of mass incarceration and the maze of laws that keep returning citizens from accessing housing, voting, and well-payibg employment. 7/

an inability to recognize white supremacy and the way it is hamstrings our economy doesn't make leaders empathetic. it makes them dumb. it keeps them from seeing + creating policies that actually SOLVE problems. AND it makes our systems stupid and easy to disrupt. 8/

not "believing" in white supremacy is like not "believing" in gravity. just because you say it doesn't exist doesn't mean that shit will stop falling to the ground. 9/

leaders that don't recognize white supremacy cannot see the world for what it is. and that makes them unfit to lead. 10/