Discrimination in Lending Markets

 NYTimes reports on the Paycheck Protection Program, which it seems black business owners were more likely to get loans from online lenders than local banks. Although there's been publicity and concern about artificial intelligence algorithms being biased, apparently in these cases they may be less biased than the banks.  (The bias in algorithms would result from training the AI app using data which was produced by biased non-AI systems, like training an app to assess beauty by using pictures of whites.)

While the report described by the Times is on black businesses, it easily relates to black farmers, including som issues which I may have touched on in the past. Back in the dark ages of the New Deal the precursors of the Farmers Home Administration were authorized to fill a financing gap, to provide loans to farmers who were credit-worthy but had been unable to get loans from local banks. Even before then the Farm Credit system was set up in the Wilson administration for the same purpose. 

The Congressional Research Service has an overview of the farm credit situation.

The Racism Behind the Decline of Black-Owned Record Stores?

I have a problem with some descriptions of the decline of black-owned farms over the last 100 years.

My problem can perhaps be illustrated by developments in another industry: record stores.  This article describes the growth of black-owned record stores.  But they are no more.  Why?  I agree that black-owned stores were more likely to fail than white-owned ones.  The owners were probably less wealthy to start with, and faced bias in getting capital for their operation. To the extent they were focused on a niche market they may also have been more vulnerable. (I'm not sure that's right--it seems that independent booksellers often have survived in niches where the Border chain went under,but for the sake of argument I'll include that factor.

But a major factor in the decline of black-owned record stores is the change in demand--people don't want vinyl or CDs these days, or not enough do to sustain a lot of stores. I'd make the same observation about the type (and size) of farm operations black farmers were mostly engaged in during the last century.

Divisions Among Black Farmer Organizations

 I have a Google Alert set up for "black farmers", dating back to the Pigford days. Today it showed two hits:

"National Black Farmers Association Announces Boycott of John Deere"

"Deere forms new coalition to assist Black farmers with property rights"

No text for either, so I'm left guessing at the story behind the scenes. 

I'll take this opportunity to note that the NBFA (headed by John Boyd) has seemed to be a lot more active in recent months than they were for a while.