POLITICS, THE ECONOMY & RACE
Marlon Weems is a storyteller at heart. He writes essays on the intersection of politics, the economy, and racism. After more than ten years on Wall Street, Marlon began his writing career as a capital markets subject-matter expert, providing his insights on capital markets to global investment banking firms. These days, he spends most of his time working on his first novel from his home on a tiny island in North Carolina.
POLITICS, THE ECONOMY & RACE
I recently had the opportunity to chat with Egberto Willies, host of Politics Done Right, his progressive YouTube channel. We discussed a lot-how corporate America focuses on shareholders instead of stakeholders, my former life as a program trader on Wall Street, and why in my view, President Biden can do very little to control the price of oil.
During his days as a US Senator, President Lyndon Johnson told a story of an unemployed schoolteacher's job interview with a school board in Depression-era Texas. At one point during the meeting, a rancher on the school board asked the teacher the following question: "How do you teach it?
For Father's Day a few years back, my wife and kids surprised me with a trip to Medieval Times, an immersive dinner theater featuring staged Arthurian-styled games, such as sword-fighting and jousting. Anyone can enjoy the forgotten age of kings and queens for a reasonable price, at least for an evening.
There is an unspoken agreement between Williams Sonoma and its store-level employees. In exchange for wages well below the poverty line, workers get discounts on the company's upscale kitchen supplies. My wife's employment there a few years ago is a case study on wage inequality.
At around 4:00 a.m. on a cold, wet morning in March 1959, 21 Black teenaged boys burned to death inside the Negro Boys’ Industrial School’s dormitory.
On January 6, 2021, a mob of Trump supporters, consisting of White supremacist militias, members of the military, and law enforcement, attacked the U.S. Capitol in an armed insurrection. The objective of the rioters was to stop the peaceful transfer of power.
At the time of his death in 1875, Hamilton was purportedly the wealthiest Black man in the United States. Believed to be America’s first Black millionaire, he amassed a fortune worth $2 million, the equivalent of $50 million today.
Socialism is always un-American until corporations need a lifeline. Just before Thanksgiving in 2017, The Wall Street Journal held its CEO Council conference, which included the country's chief executive officers. It featured Gary Cohn, then the chief economic advisor for the Trump administration.
Schumer’s control of a 50–50 Senate rests on Vice President Kamala Harris’ ability to break ties as president of the Senate, which is meaningless unless he holds his caucus of 50 Democratic Senators together. And with Joe Manchin and Kyrsten Sinema often veering to the right, that’s a very tall order.
SUBJECT-MATTER EXPERTISE