The Defenders Online | A Civil Rights Blog » Economic Justice

The Black Tax: Alive and Still Powerful

The Editors — Wed, 11 Jan 2012 16:04:24 +0000

By Lee A. Daniels
What Negro Americans faced then was a fierce discrimination that confined them literally and figuratively to a very small corner of American life. Entire categories of jobs, or levels of jobs were off-limits to blacks, and there was virtually no protection for the endemic on-the-job racism those who had jobs endured.

Jacqueline Berrien on leading the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission

The Editors — Wed, 12 Oct 2011 20:16:16 +0000

By Tom Fox via The Washington Post
Jacqueline A. Berrien has been the chair of the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) since April 2010. A Harvard Law School graduate, Berrien practiced civil rights law for many years, assisted underrepresented groups as a program officer for the Ford Foundation, and came to the EEOC from the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, where she served as associate director-counsel.

Prime-time Fine for Subprime Loans

The Editors — Tue, 26 Jul 2011 15:33:04 +0000

By Doug Miller
In the largest civil penalty it has ever issued, the Federal Reserve fined Wells Fargo & Co. $85 million to settle allegations that the San Francisco-based bank maneuvered borrowers into taking out costlier subprime home loans and falsified information on mortgage applications.

PrimeLending Settles Federal Discrimination Complaint

The Editors — Fri, 10 Dec 2010 22:00:45 +0000

By Doug Miller
Facing prosecution by the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ), national mortgage lender PrimeLending has agreed to pay $2 million to African-American home buyers who the federal agency says were unfairly charged higher interest rates because of their race.

Senate Approves Billions for Settlements for Black Farmers and Native Americans

The Editors — Wed, 24 Nov 2010 17:02:26 +0000

By The Editors
The separate, decades-long odyssey by tens of thousands of black farmers and hundreds of thousands of Native Americans to gain a measure of justice – and compensation – from the federal government is apparently nearing a just conclusion. The Senate last week approved a total of $4.55 billion to settle charges of wrongdoing the groups had brought in separate lawsuits.

Court Finds “Strong Inference” of Discrimination in Louisiana/HUD Post-Hurricane Recovery Program

The Editors — Sat, 31 Jul 2010 03:59:26 +0000

The funding formula used to provide grants to New Orleans residents whose homes were damaged or destroyed by Hurricanes Katrina and Rita very likely disadvantaged black homeowners because it was based on depressed property values that result from both current racial isolation and the city’s segregated past, a U.S. District Court judge has indicated. As [...]

For Blacks and Latinos: Access to the Wireless Web = Access to the Mainstream

The Editors — Wed, 14 Jul 2010 00:58:28 +0000

By Lee A. Daniels The so-called digital divide in possession and use of cell phones, laptops and other such devices – which once prompted anguished predictions that black Americans would be left behind on the information superhighway – is fast narrowing.

Obama Administration Offers Settlement for Black Farmers

The Editors — Wed, 24 Feb 2010 03:31:15 +0000

By The Editors For more than a decade, the class-action lawsuit involving tens of thousands of the nation’s black farmers on the one side and the federal Department of Agriculture on the other stood as a dramatic symbol of the institutional racism undermining even black Americans involved in one of America’s mythic occupations.

Dying Quietly: The Employee Free Choice Act

The Editors — Tue, 02 Feb 2010 22:29:14 +0000

By Doug Miller Legislation in Congress that would make it easier for workers to form unions is doomed because the Obama administration , with so many other hard contentious issues on its agenda, won’t risk political capital in its defense, according to some experts on trade unionism.

Unequal Opportunity and Whitewashed Resumes

The Editors — Wed, 20 Jan 2010 20:06:38 +0000

By Khalil Gibran Muhammad "Education is the key to success. Knowledge is power." Wise words repeated countless times to young people at home and in school every single day. But what should we say to them if one day their hard work meets empty promises, if their dreams are deferred, or their first paycheck of material reward is marked insufficient funds.

HAITI 90999/YELE 501501 or: How I Learned to Stop Fretting and Appreciate Social Networks

The Editors — Wed, 20 Jan 2010 17:25:38 +0000

By Jill Nelson
The Haitian earthquake crisis will be remembered as the moment in which the technology and platforms that enable social networking were used and transformed by ordinary citizens—the period when Twitter, Facebook, blogs, and other social networking sites became agents of change, and technology transcended commercialism, politics, personality, and trivia.

Fresh Food for All: Emergency Food Organizations and the Food Justice Movement in NYC

The Editors — Thu, 27 Aug 2009 17:57:36 +0000

By Chinyere Osuala Just Food, a non-profit organization that advocates a just and sustainable food system in New York City, hosted a site visit on Tuesday to the Farm at Miller’s Crossing in Hudson, N.Y. to bring staff, volunteers, and clients of inner-city emergency food organizations in touch with the farms that provide them with fresh fruits and vegetables, weekly, through Just Food’s Fresh Food For All Program.

The Long, Bitter History of Predatory Lending against African Americans

The Editors — Tue, 04 Aug 2009 20:00:24 +0000

By Beryl Satter
In the 1950s, speculators combed white neighborhoods, purchasing property from whites and then reselling them to blacks—at double to quadruple market value. Even worse, they sold these overpriced properties “on contract,” that is, on the installment plan. Black buyers made a down payment and were responsible for taxes, insurance, maintenance, and interest, but could lose the property if they missed even one payment. They were forced to accept such brutal terms, since in Chicago as nationally, most banks refused to loan to them; if they wanted to buy at all, they had to buy from speculators.

John Payton Debates Patrick Buchanan on Sotomayor and Ricci

The Editors — Fri, 17 Jul 2009 17:23:57 +0000

By The Editors John Payton vigorously defended Judge Sonia Sotomayor’s fitness to serve on the U.S. Supreme Court yesterday in a charged debate with conservative commentator Patrick Buchanan on the MSNBC program “Hardball with Chris Matthews.”

Obama Picks LDF Deputy to Head Equal Employment Opportunity Commission

The Editors — Fri, 17 Jul 2009 03:11:22 +0000

By The Editors
President Obama will nominate Jacqueline A. Berrien, Associate Director-Counsel of the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund (LDF), to be the new Chair of the federal Equal Employment Opportunity Commission.

Supreme Court Decision Permits More Aggressive Efforts to Combat Predatory Lending

The Editors — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 02:50:17 +0000

By The Editors The U.S. Supreme Court today declared that the nation’s laws banning discrimination in lending can and should be enforced by all levels of government, not just federal agencies.

Divided We Stand: The tale of Ella and May as seen from the 32nd floor

The Editors — Mon, 23 Mar 2009 20:14:34 +0000

By John Shearer Ella and May grew up worlds apart. Ella, 60 and single, spent her early years in Greenwich Connecticut and was a runner up in the Miss Black America beauty pageant. May, 40, started life on Chicago's South Side. Ella went to Smith College. May was a gang-banger who somehow managed to get by.