by Holmes Hummel
How does money pile up in the hands of a few?
My great-great-grandfathers accumulated wealth by claiming as their own the productivity of stolen land, captured people, and institutions organized by and for white Christian men. By contrast, the wealth inherited by my generation is accumulated today through investments in branded corporations that handle all the messy transactions of the global economy on our behalf as shareholders, paying dividends on the same types of systems that generated proceeds for my family’s lauded patriarchs.