Created Equal: Can white privilege be quantified?
Author and journalist Tracie McMillan joined the show to discuss a tangible way for white America to confront the advantage that keeps our nation unequal.
"The White Bonus" by Tracie McMillan.
White privilege begins with the idea that white Americans have inherent advantage in society because of racist policies and practices throughout history.
But how does someone measure how much advantage they received?
Author and journalist Tracie McMillan tried her hand at it by evaluating how race worked in favor of several families — including her own. She then calculated how much of a monetary “bonus” they received for being white. McMillan’s “bonus” was approximately $371,000.
She joined Stephen Henderson on Created Equal to discuss how and why she believes this approach is a tangible way for white America to confront the advantage that keeps our nation unequal.
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Guest:
Tracie McMillan is a journalist and author of “The White Bonus.” She says her approach with this book was to prioritize the data and numbers.
“The idea of a white bonus is to be like, let’s take away your feelings, let’s take away intent, let’s just look at did you get any money probably because you are white,” McMillan said. “Most of the things I looked into there’s always a clear corollary between advantage and whiteness.”
Listen to Created Equal with host Stephen Henderson weekdays from 9-10 a.m. ET on 101.9 WDET and streaming on-demand.
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