Money is a Black-Ass Lie
Welcome to This Black-Ass Life! We’re coming to you live on Tuesday which is the new day we’ll be bringing you this newsletter biweekly (the twice-a-month kind of biweekly). This week, we are channeling our best Tyra at the keyboard in Life Size to talk about the Silicon Valley Bank collapse. Bear with us!
I. The Facts
Banks continue their play-play chicanery with our money, and capitalism remains a hilariously nonsensical economic system. Last week, Silicon Valley Bank (SVB), founded in 1983 after a poker game (y’all simply cannot convince us money is real!!!) and ranked the 16th largest bank in America, collapsed.
This is a big deal. SVB was the second-largest bank failure in U.S. history.
A few days ago, after reporting a nearly 2 billion dollar tax loss and an urgent need to raise capital, SVB depositors moved quickly to get their coins out of the bank.
Here’s the kicker. SVB, like other banks, only carries a portion of depositors’ money in cash, so it couldn’t honor its depositors' withdrawal requests after the news broke.
The FDIC took over the bank on Friday, March 10, to run people their money (or at least access it) by Monday, March 13.
The FDIC coverage limit is typically $250,000 per depositor, per bank, in each account ownership category. However, the government is signaling that regulators may unwind funds, “to ensure that depositors will have full access to their funds.”
Sidenote: The most important alternative theory we must consider from WSJ is whether this could have been the fault of “1 Black,” “1 LGBTQ,” and “2 Veterans." The power that one negro must hold! Wow.
Why does it matter?
This is some f*cksh*t. The same government that has allowed student debt to balloon to a level where people are literally stuck in early adulthood due to their inability to pay for an education they were told would guarantee them a more prosperous future, is now moving at the speed of light to save another damn bank.
Here is what it is in America. Our government can’t seem to find the money to completely fulfill a promised $2,000 stimulus and continues to debate $10,000 toward student debt relief, but here comes Captain America saving the most American of us all: bankers.
This is not to say people shouldn’t get their money back. But isn’t it comical how multimillionaires start cosplaying as working-class people when they need a bail-out?
Banks going belly-up also have real-life consequences: it’s the workers who now face shaky payrolls; the sellers on Etsy who will experience delay in receiving payments; the people who consider harming themselves or worse because they face financial ruin; the continued deregulation of this industry that will continue to hurt people.
What can my Black ass do?
Check out this Black-ass anti-capitalism reading list.
Black people, capitalism is not liberation, and it will not save us. Money will not free us. For far too long, there has been an intermingling of our liberation with capitalism with movements like buying back the block. These initiatives can be and are harmful. For example, buying back the block does not address (and often exacerbates) the harms of gentrification, including the forced displacement of other Black people.
Get your LLC if you want to, but Black entrepreneurship or anything that upholds or furthers these dizzyingly structured and oppressive systems in which we find ourselves (including nonprofits!), is not the path to anyone’s liberation.
Those at the top will always be protected. They’ll always be bailed out. We can’t play by their rules or think their funny money will save us.
II. Other Things
Black-ass happenings
We absolutely love seeing how Abbott Elementary is tackling the issue of charter schools and privatization. Who would have thought that privatizing education, sending naive white young uncertified “teachers” funded through nefarious as F streams into classrooms, and displacing teachers of color with ties to the community, was not a sound idea? Who would have thought?!
Megan is THEE hottie; so happy to have her back with us! We love you, Meg!
Read, and then read again this profile of Janelle Monae by Tre’vell Anderson. Also, the photos. They are FINE.
Celebrating 10 years of The Read in TIME.
We have an extended Little Mermaid trailer!
I (Jumoke) am so proud to be a Candy Cane. Candiace Dillard Bassett hive over here!
San Francisco is debating reparations.
Our Black-Ass song(s) of the week (Mitu):
“If you got a problem, come see me about it!” - Candiace 3:16 (featuring the baddest Trina).
Things we look forward to:
I (Jumoke) look forward to Cartagena and experiencing Afro-Colombian culture!
I (Mitu) look forward to Creed III, and to Jonathan Majors as my Sherlock Holmes and Michael B. Jordan as his Watson.
lll. Text From A Black-Ass Parent
It don’t take much for my (Jumoke’s) family to bring it back to the Almighty. God is good? All the time. All the time even and especially on International Women’s Day? God is good.
Stay Black, have a snack, and take a nap today. We'll hit your inbox next on March 28!