Black MBA - Fall 2008 - (Page 34)

FEATURE Is the Middle Class Disappearing? socially prominent Black families and individuals in America. “It is important to draw the distinctions because we are not a monolith and we need to give our children permission to say, ‘I want to be a member of the best and brightest’ – not so that they can look down on other people, but so that they can say, ‘I want to set my goals as high as any high-achieving white person would say,’” he explains. According to Graham, no discussion of class distinctions is complete without reference to values and lifestyle. He says the Black middle class should be defined in part by its emphasis on grooming its children for academic and professional excellence. He defines the Black upper class by its success in transferring intergenerational wealth and long-standing affiliations with certain schools and social organizations. “We have so much to fight against when it comes to our image and the way that we are portrayed,” Graham says of African Americans. “We’ve embraced the stereotype that being ambitious or wealthy is to no longer be authentically Black,” he says. “We’ve embraced it so closely that it’s hard to let go of it. This is why young Black children are accused of trying to be white when they use good diction.” The road from tenuous middleclass status to the upper-class Graham chronicles is long and rife with economic and social challenges for African Americans, but it’s hard to challenge the wisdom of pursuing higher education, wealth accumulation and cultural enrichment. Several initiatives led by local and national organizations are underway to shore up the Black middle class by providing financial education with an emphasis on debt reduction, household budgeting and long-term investment. Rising awareness of the precarious state of the Black middle class, combined with education and effective government policy, will help. African Americans’ history of resilience despite extreme economic disadvantage provides cause for optimism as well. mba Geoff Ratliff, the finance and accounting director of Habitat for Humanity – Newark, believes that all Black people have an obligation to advocate for educational and occupational opportunities for the least fortunate. He sees a growing number of Black professionals who are so focused on the day-to-day grind of competing in the workplace and providing for their families that they’ve lost sight of their broader responsibilities to the race. “We need to make an effort to reach back and help each other,” he says. “I don’t think that’s happening at the level that it should be.” The University of Virginia graduate who also holds an MBA from St. Louis University says today’s young professionals haven’t experienced the kind of overt racism and segregation that forged strong ties among Black people in their parents’ generation regardless of income, education or occupation. “We are the first adult generation of African Americans who have not had a defining purpose or struggle like the civil rights movement to unify our race,” he says. “The identity factors aren’t forced upon us; we have to make the effort to unify ourselves.” This may be a hard sell for the increasing number of African Americans who have a hard time seeing themselves as connected to Blacks 34 BlackMBA • Fall 2008 • www.nbmbaa.org on the other side of the class divide. In recent years, African Americans have begun to perceive a chasm between middle class and poor Blacks that goes beyond financial considerations. The differences are so pronounced that nearly 40 percent of African Americans surveyed by the Pew Research Center last year said that Blacks can no longer be thought of as a single race. Just 53 percent said Blacks still have enough in common to be considered a race. More than 60 percent of the surveyed Blacks said the values of middle class and poor Blacks have diverged in the last decade. Nearly a third said the two groups share “little” or “almost no” values in common. “Values” were defined as “things that people view as important or their general way of thinking.” But describing these values in detail often proves controversial. Lawrence Otis Graham, author of Our Kind of People: Inside America’s Black Upper Class, has caught considerable flack for his efforts to identify and document the credentials and customs of the African-American elite. Unapologetically, he believes that work like his has the power to uplift all Black people by giving them a worthy model of success to emulate. In fact, his next book, The Our Kind of People 800 Register, intends to list the wealthiest, best-educated and most http://www.nbmbaa.org

Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of Black MBA - Fall 2008

Black MBA - Fall 2008 Contents Online From the Chairman From the President & CEO Up Front Who is Middle Class? Life and Times of the Middle Class Modern Times CEO to CEO: Why Didn’t I Think of That? Pass it Forward 30 Years of Conference NBMBAA Board of Directors Honorary Co-Chairs Conference History Speaker Showcase Industry Theatre NBMBAA Case Competition® Scholarship Winners NBMBAA Chapter Presidents Conference 2009: New Orleans The New Face of Recruitment Part-Time is the Right Time Across the Pond On Campus Board Bound MBAs for the USA Market Reality: Good Tapping Company Resources On the Move Employer Profiles Leading Bias-Free Mentoring Matters Faith in Corporate Circles Mideast Region Steps Up its Game Collegiate Chapters All in the Family How to… International Markets Are You Happy? Survive and Thrive Striking a Balance Advertiser Index In Focus

Black MBA - Fall 2008

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