Want to create an interactive transcript for this episode?
Podcast: New Books in Finance
Episode: Calvin Schermerhorn, "The Plunder of Black America: How the Racial Wealth Gap Was Made" (Yale UP, 2025)
Description: Dr. J Calvin Schermerhorn is a professor of history in the School of Historical, Philosophical, and Religious Studies at Arizona State University. His books include The Business of Slavery and the Rise of American Capitalism, 1815–1860, and Unrequited Toil: A History of United States Slavery. He lives in Tempe, AZ.
The long history of the racial wealth gap in America told through the stories of seven Black families who struggled to build wealth over multiple generationsWealth is central to the American pursuit of happiness and is an overriding measure of well-being. Yet wealth is conspicuously absent from...