Jessicah Pierre
Jessicah Pierre is the inequality media specialist at the Institute for Policy Studies.
Articles by this author
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Views Tuesday, January 14, 2020 Learning from King’s Last Campaign As we celebrate the legacy of Martin Luther King Jr., it’s natural to remember his courageous advocacy for racial equity. But before he was assassinated, King had also begun to broaden his efforts to unify the around economic justice. That’s worth remembering today. In December 1967, King, the... Read more |
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Views Thursday, September 19, 2019 What the Felicity Huffman Scandal Says About America Earlier this year, a number of wealthy parents, celebrities, and college prep coaches were accused of offering large bribes to elite universities in order to get their children into schools they didn’t qualify for. Federal prosecutors charged at least 50 people in the criminal investigation named “... Read more |
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Views Thursday, August 22, 2019 400 Years After Slavery’s Start, No More Band-Aids Four hundred years ago this month, the first enslaved people from Africa arrived in Virginia. Slavery is often reduced to a crime of America’s long-ago past. But enslaved labor created the backbone for America’s capitalistic economy, allowing it to grow into — and remain — the world’s leading... Read more |
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Views Wednesday, June 19, 2019 Celebrating Juneteenth With Bold New Ideas One day in late June, 1865, Union soldiers arrived in Galveston, Texas. They carried some historic news: Legal slavery had ended some two and a half years ago with President Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation. And so some of the last enslaved people left in America were freed. The day became known... Read more |
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Views Saturday, June 08, 2019 Racism as a Public Health Crisis Racism is often viewed as an action performed by individuals. But even if we got rid of all America’s prejudiced individuals, racism would still exist in the systems they built. Systemic racism, writer Jenee Desmond-Harris explains, refers to how racial disparities operate “in major parts of U.S... Read more |
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Views Thursday, April 18, 2019 A Revolutionary Idea to Close the Racial Wealth Divide The gap between America’s ultra-wealthy and the rest of us is growing dramatically as wealth continues to concentrate at the top at the expense of the rest of us. One major symptom of this economic rift is the racial wealth divide, which is greater today than it was nearly four decades ago. The... Read more |
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Views Wednesday, March 20, 2019 The Real College Admissions Scandal In what’s being called the largest college admissions scam ever, a number of wealthy parents, celebrities, and college prep coaches have been accused of offering large bribes to get rich students into Ivy League schools, regardless of their credentials. The parents facing charges allegedly paid up... Read more |
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Views Wednesday, January 16, 2019 A Dream Deferred: MLK’s Dream of Economic Justice is Far From Reality January 15th marked what would’ve been Dr. Martin Luther King’s 90th birthday. Most known for his famous “I Have Dream Speech,” King envisioned a future in which deep racial inequalities — including deep economic inequality — was eradicated. He worked tirelessly towards that mission. Over 50 years... Read more |
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Views Wednesday, October 31, 2018 As Midterm Nears, Trump Returns to an Old Formula: Lies and Hatred Midterm elections are approaching. The first major election since Trump took office, our current political landscape could shift dramatically depending on the results. If Democrats can take back control of the House of Representatives — or even the Senate — that could have a major effect on Trump’s... Read more |
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Views Thursday, June 21, 2018 Celebrating the End of Slavery—With One Big Asterisk During the week of June 19, cities around the country mark Juneteenth — the oldest known celebration commemorating the end of slavery in the United States. Dating back to 1865, two and a half years after President Lincoln signed the Emancipation Proclamation, this holiday marks the day when Union... Read more |