ore than 50 years ago, Dr. Martin Luther King observed that most white people in the United States “believe that American society is essentially hospitable to fair play and to steady growth toward a middle-class utopia, embodying racial harmony.”
“But unfortunately,” he added, “this is a fantasy of self-deception and comfortable vanity.”
This fantasy is on full display in the United States today. While race is increasingly discussed when it comes to immigration, police violence, or white nationalism, one of its most impactful legacies is seldom named: the racial wealth divide.
That divide is much bigger than most people suppose. It’s also fixable — if we confront it directly.
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