Before becoming a founding member of NAACP, W.E.B. Du Bois (1868-1963) was already well known as one of the foremost Black intellectuals of his era. The first Black American to earn a PhD from Harvard University, Du Bois published widely before becoming NAACP’s director of publicity and research.
University of Massachusetts Amherst reports on a speech given by Du Bois in 1953:
In this speech Du Bois presents current “facts and tendencies” that constitute the future struggle of African Americans. He traces the history of African American protest and resistance through the era of slavery and on into the pressing needs for enfranchisement and broader social and civil rights.
In Du Bois’ view, however, the most pressing problem facing African Americans is that “the economic organization of America may have fundamental injustices and shortcomings which seriously affect not only Negroes, but the world.”
He emphasizes the need for African Americans to align themselves with those worldwide who are fighting for better economic conditions, and not to mistake the accumulation of private wealth as progress.
The speech included one of my favourite quotes:
We should measure the prosperity of a nation not by the number of millionaires but by the absence of poverty, the prevalence of health, the efficiency of public schools, and the number of people who can and do read worthwhile books.”
Save us, World-Spirit, from our lesser selves!
A Hymn to the Peoples
Grant us that war and hatred cease,
Reveal our souls in every race and hue!
Helpus, O Human God, in this Thy Truce,
to make Humanity divine!
in-sights.ca 
Du Bois maintained that Black Americans should not be struggling just to attain the right to be exploited equally, but to change the system that was essentially enslaving all workers.
“The wealth of the nation – the land and water, the coal and oil, the iron and aluminum, ought not belong to the nation some say, but to those who by chance or cheating have legal power to make you pay their price for what God gave them. Even if ten or ten thousand men combine and in sweated sacrifice make steel, wheat, corn, meat or shoes, the result of the combined labor belongs to one or a few of them while the others scramble to keep from starving.”
Just as he warned, Blacks have arguably achieved the right to be exploited equally, but not much else has changed in the equation. Except the gap between the few at the top and the masses below has widened. We appear to be slow learners, especially when it comes to voting against our own best interests.
As for the efficiency of public schools and the number of people who can and do read worthwhile books, the actions of Republican censors in the schools and libraries of the American South (notably Florida) must have him rolling in his grave.
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Great objectives but how to get them. I know of a number of attempts to achieve these fine and fair objectives, as I am sure so do you.
I have asked our premier to correct taxation from “regressive” to “progressive”, so far failed.
When the private, commercial banks bought out the independent investment dealers I asked the then Min. of Finance to block further financial sector ownership concentration to stop the process of cartel formation. It work , sort of, but only because the evidence of “cartel misbehavior” I provided was beyond any challenge. That evidence is no longer effective as demonstrated by two $150 billion , temporary bailouts and the 2022 bank liquidity facility, operated by the Bank of Canada.
In 2013 the chief economist of the Bank of England, Andrew Haldane, spoke to a convention of UK pension fund investment managers. On behalf of Gov. Carney, he suggested the pension funds would likely be called upon the bailout the commercial banks, as a patriotic duty.
The theme above is that your money could become our money should the occasion require it. This attitude has evolved from the last century when the law and politicians held the belief, that to avoid “conflicts of interest events”, parts needed to be independent of each other.
The never ending pressure to form cartels and monopolies has and is taking a growing financial toll on citizens and I don’t see any but a few like you and I trying to help people understand the reason for their hardships. You have documented the staggering size of the financial reserves currently held by BC municipalities. These are the product of monopolies and over taxation.
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