RMA Speaker Presentation

Introduction – Ron Riggert

Title – “”The Myth That Made Us””

Speaker – Jeffrey Fuhrer

Topic – “The Myth That Made Us”. It will consider how our false narratives about post-racism and meritocracy have been used to condone egregious economic outcomes – and what we can do to fix the system.

Speaker Bio – Jeffrey Fuhrer works as a Nonresident Fellow for the Brookings Institution and a Foundation Fellow for the Eastern Bank Foundation. He has just published The Myth That Made Us (MIT Press 2023). The book explores the link between widely held but false narratives about poverty and race and poor outcomes for many in the U.S. economy. In addition, he is working with a large collaborative to update the findings of the Federal Reserve’s 2015 “Color of Wealth in Boston” study. This group hopes to use the new findings to design programs and policies to close the wealth gap in the Greater Boston metro area and surrounding communities. Jeff recently finished a 2 ½ year term as a senior fellow at the Harvard Kennedy School of Government. In that capacity, he conducted research on the Federal Reserve’s new monetary policy framework, and sources of the racial and ethnic wealth gaps. A discussion of The Myth That Made Us: How our false narratives about post-racism and meritocracy have been used to condone egregious economic outcomes—and what we can do to fix the system. The Myth That Made Us exposes how false narratives—of a supposedly post-racist nation, of the self-made man, of the primacy of profit- and shareholder value-maximizing for businesses, and of minimal government interference—have been used to excuse gross inequities and to shape and sustain the US economic system that delivers them. Jeff Fuhrer argues that systemic racism continues to produce vastly disparate outcomes and that our brand of capitalism favors doing little to reduce disparities. Evidence from other developed capitalist economies shows it doesn’t have to be that way. We broke this (mean-spirited) economy. We can fix it.