Evolving the Talented Tenth, to Become a Talented Majority

In the years just after the Civil War’s Reconstruction, scholars debated how to achieve economic progress for the American slave and their descendants.

Infamously Booker T. Washington embraced the reality of discrimination, and proclaimed that SKILLS were the only way to thrive amidst discrimination.

Conversely, W.E.B. DuBois embraced the hope of political and social shifts that might benefit all of those descendants by way of a producing and sustaining a talented tenth.

See https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/race/etc/road.html

There are certainly a few people who stand out above the rest.

Warren Thompson and his expanding hospitality empire, is a very rare success.

The 2 (Arnold and Kenneth) out of 500+ largest company CEO’s is indeed, very rare.

Depending on people like Warren Thompson, Arnold Donald, and Kenneth Frazier to lift “all” boats is neither sustainable nor realistic.

Very few actually become ‘successful’ financially, rendering / cementing “median” wealth at its low levels.

The question becomes, how to scale?  How to raise “median” wealth among economically disadvantaged people?

Idolizing ‘rockstars’ (the few ball players and big business executives) becomes rather useless for raising median living standards because by definition, they are rare, data points that exist on the far right side of the bellcurve.

Is it possible for talent to be more equitably distributed among a larger majority of economically disadvantaged American households, than to depend on the ‘Talent Tenth’?

We find in America’s history, only one incident that closed the median wealth gap.

It was marked by the Great Migration. Which was preceded by what we call “Peak philanthropy”.

“Peak Philanthropy” and Other Contributors to the Great Migration

However, in the 19th century, America became visibly worse, before it got better. Herein, the probability of relations getting worse before they get better, may be high.

Managing the Economic Impact of Rising Discrimination Concerns

If history repeats itself, then any societal ‘turbulence’ will prompt a higher proportion of America’s HNW families to independently choose to concentrate wealth LESS into their children, and find MORE ways to invest into those who do not inherit a fund sufficient to pay for life’s expenses.

Below for registered members…

  • we discuss what we’re doing about this, to avoid any ‘turbulence’ on our way to another era of peak philanthropy – we reveal our plans for the next decade of work and projects we seek to lead and how you can work alongside us.
  • we discuss more scalable solutions… to reduce dependency on such ‘rare’ talent.
  • we discuss popular investments today, and compare those to economically successful investments that were made in the early 20th century.

We’re seeking less dependence on the ‘rare’ successes, and we seek to find ways to to raise the “median” standard.

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Author: pH14 Plan Staff

pH14 Plan is an economic development model for all U.S. households' participation. You can support this research by subscribing for more access, or contact us to make a gift.

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