Check me out at the annual Black Effect Podcast Festival, happening Saturday, April twenty seventh in Atlanta. Live podcasts are on deck from some of your favorite shows, including this one, Black Tech, Green Money, and also some of the best podcasts in the game like Deeply Well with Debbie Brown and Carefully Reckless. Atlanta is one of my favorite cities
in the world. I've lived there for two years. Actually, in my worldview, seeing us successful in every industry and not having any limits on our potential largely was shaped by Atlanta. So to be there with you doing this podcast talking about how we build or leverage technology to bill wealth. Come on, man, doesn't get better. I want to see you there. Get your tickets today at Black Effect dot comback Slash Podcast Festival. I'm Will Lucas and this is Black Tech, Green Money.
I'll find so.
David has committed his life to actualizing a more just and equitable world. His resume is page is long, but for the sake of this podcast, he's President and CEO of the Global Black Economic Forum, focused on reimagining what diverse, the equity, inclusion and opportunity looks like in global workspaces and marketplaces. As well as achieving the notion of economic justice.
For black people all over the world. As someone who's worked across various sectors like he.
Has, including public service, business, nonprofit, and more, how does Alfonzo believe technology.
Can be levised to address systemic inequalities.
I think that leveraging technology driven solutions to address systemic inequalities really require collaboration. It requires us to reach across sectors that considered challenges against marginalized communities or what marginalized communities are facing. What I mean by that is we have to look in education, we have to look at wealth management, we have to look at policy advocacy, we have to look at health equity, we have to look at entrepreneurship, and in all of those different sectors we
can leverage technology driven solutions to a systemic inequality. So, as an example, if you look at education, technology can provide access to quality education and training, which is really essential to economic empowerment and other things that we think of when we generally think of education, and the educational platforms can really break down barriers to education with marginalized communities to support resource challenge public schools and maybe provide
students with skills and knowledge that can help close the wage gap. So you take another example wealth management. Fintech innovations such as mobile banking and digital wallets and peer to peer lending can expand access to financial services for underserved populations, including those with traditional banking accounts and credit intories. So by providing alternative financial solutions, technology can help marginalize individuals build assets, improve their economic resilience. And then maybe
we think of a healthcare as another sector. Telemedicine and mobile health applications can improve access to healthcare services for communities with limited physical access to medical facilities, and so if you're living in a remote setting, for example, where it's difficult to gain access to other resources that people have if they live in urban areas, telemedicine can be incredibly helpful in addressing the gaps in healthcare delivery and
in fact empowering people to take control of their own health.
You said a couple things in there. I want to point out one. You mentioned the phrase wealth management. I believe you said wealth generation also, but I'm not positive on that one. But I was thinking about reading your background. You know, you've been involved in some really groundbreaking legislation. Helping push those things, pushing things forward in particularly around you know, social and economic systems. Is there an imperative
for black people to build wealth? Do we have a responsibility to build wealth?
Yes? Yes and yes. Look, as black people, we have centuries of colonization, enslavement, and systemic inequality that have impeded our ability to gain financial freedom and the dignity that we actually deserve. And when we talk about financial management, when we talk about wealth generation, often people want to divorce it from colonization, they want to divorce it from slavery, they want to divorce it from systemic inequality, and we
can't do that. We have to sort of recognize the systems that we operate within and how important it is that we take our personal liberties and use those liberties that we have gained from our ancestors to achieve financial freedom. You know, the most recent data from the Federal Reserve Survey, I think it indicated during COVID that the wealth gap widened. So between twenty nineteen and twenty twenty two, you know this,
the medium wealth saw an increase. However, the weave gap or the wealth gap increase for people who are racial minorities and if you put an even finer point on that, when Martin Luther King gave a speech on the March in Washington in the nineteen sixties, the wealth gap was eight to one, and today that wealth gap is twelve for me on the other way, Yeah, it's going the
other way. And as much as people talk about, you know, advancements in technology and advancements in economic empowerment and all of the other categories, we're seeing this gap increase between white and black people. We take another category, housing equity. We're seeing that black households chilled, some improved, but we're also seeing a gap with respect to home equity, whether black people actually have the ability to purchase homes and
hold onto those homes. We're seeing existing and exacerbating disparities. So what I would say to your question is, we have to think about the centuries of systemic discrimination in public policy and financial practices, in societal norms that have hindered our ability to acquire black wealth. And it's all of our individual and collective responsibilities to address that, not only through structural reforms, but also our individual actions.
So I'm going to ask this a different way. You're saying it's not okay, then to be comfortable with your little salary taking care of you and your little house. Is that safe to say?
That is safe to say? You know that is safe to say because you know, I have to often think about the work that I do and why I continue to do with what motivates me to do this work, And I often think back to our ancestors and the folks that were killed, that were murdered in order for us to be in the position that we're in. So just putting that lens on and thinking about the responsibility that we have to further advance the interests of marginalized
communities and specifically black people. Not only do we owe it to ourselves, but the systems that we operate in were intentionally created to oppress us. So you're either going to be subjugating yourself to a process and a system that exists to oppress you, or you're going to work to overcome those systems collectively as a community and also individually.
I like that. I like that.
So when you think about black entrepreneurship in those even using technology or building technology black entrepreneurship, what, in your opinion are some of the most pressing issues and concerns facing us.
Well, I think what you would hear most often from folks that operate in these spaces is acsets to capital, access to capital, access to capital, access to capital. We have black entrepreneurs all over the world, all over this country, often facing challenges in accessing access to startup capital, including venture capital funding. You may know this, Black women, women of color business founders received only zero point zero three
eight percent of venture capital dollars. So to put that in context, two hundred and eighty eight billion dollars is allocated each year through the venture capital infrastructure, and of the two hundred and eighty eight billion dollars, only zero point three eight percent those are women of public. That is something that should be alarming to all of us.
So if you want to start your own business and you're looking for investors, you're looking for people to actually support you and grow that business, it's going to be difficult for you to find that in the current infrastructure. So access to capital is incredibly important and one of the main obstacles that we face. The second I would
say is market access and contracts. Black owned technology companies often encounter challenges in securing contracts and assessing markets dominated by large or more established firms, so they have to overcome those barriers every single day. And we have to think about how we foster supply diversity initiatives. What I mean by that for those who may not know, you know, if I run a company, I usually I'm in the
business also of buying products and services. If I'm buying products and services and I'm only buying products and services from non black people or non people of color, that's going to exacerbate the problem. So this idea of market access and contracts is incredibly important. And I would say
another challenge is global digital divide. You know, digital inclusion efforts like ensuring access to soft and hard infrastructure can really help bridge the digital divide from marginalized communities, but that's often quite difficult to do because we don't have access to it. And then I would say, finally, we're talking about building collaborative infrastructures and systems, and we don't have that ability in many cases because we're excluded from
the process. So bringing together stakeholders from government, from industry, from the non for profit sector to help create a supportive ecosystem for black entrepreneurs in tech is also I think a significant barrier.
I'm so glad you mentioned contracting because I want to ask you about that and because you teed that up. You know, outside of what I do here, I have a small business also, and we've been as several times. You know, we participate in bidding processes and typically I would avoid that because the barrier to just complete the applications, particularly when we talking about governments and whether it's local, municipal government or federal. Forget federal, that's a whole other beast.
But I'm just like, you know, it'll take me a month just to respond and then you got to try to win it, you know, so you'll spend forty eighty, you know, one hundred and twenty hours just trying to respond to an RFP and then may not even get it. So how do small businesses, particularly black owned small businesses, position themselves? And I guess I'm phrasing that in a way of is it designed that way to keep us out because they know we can't spend the time to do this.
Yeah, you know, I had the privilege of serving in government for twelve years, and I had the privilege of serving as Council to the governor of New York, the first black man to have that rule. And you think of the State of New York being a progressive place. I happen to have the privilege of serving as the first black person, black man, I should say to service counselors for the governor. There were black women that served in that role, but unfortunately I remain the only black
man to serve in that role. And when I served in that role, I had again the privilege of drafting and working on legislation that included the Minority and Women Owned Business Program. So this is a program that exists in New York and other parts of the country. The goal is to increase opportunities for minority contractors and women contractors to get business with the State of New York,
and that exists in many other parts of the country. Now, to your point, the systems, I believe were created in such a burdensome way that it makes it difficult for people just to go through the application process. And when I was there, one of the key goals that I had was how do we demystify this process and how do we make it simpler. Now you were here on the other side, people say, well, we need to keep this process as is, because what can learned about fraud.
That's the argument why these programs that the application process is so difficult, is they argue that we need to make sure that we eliminate or reduce or address fraud. And I would say that obviously is a legitimate concern.
So what they say about yeah, exactly, that.
May be a legitimate concern. But what you can't answer for me is why of the billions of dollars we have allocated out in contracting, only point x percent are
going to black and brown people? Why is that? And no one was able to answer that question, which is why I worked with a large and very talented team in advancing that legislation but also breaking down the barriers to entry for people right, making sure that it was easier for people to get those contracts, and also importantly holding the agencies accountable right because in many of these cases, the agencies could grant what's called waivers if they couldn't
find a minority contractor or a woman contractor, they would grant a waiver to a white owned business to do the work. And what we did when I was in government is eliminate that waiver process so that it went through an additional review process that agencies didn't have the
right just to grant those waivers. And I think that's what we need in many parts of the country, is additional accountability efforts to make sure that market access and contracts are actually available to black entrepreneurs who are seeking to do business with government agencies around the country.
Yeah, I love that.
One of the things that we don't talk about, I think enough, you know, on this podcast, is addiction. And we talk about mental health, we talk about things like that, but we don't talk about addiction, particularly in technology often and even instrumental in creating treatment centers for addiction and etc. And even advancing economic empowerment through policy. And I wonder, like, what are the wrap arounds or the rap rounds that should be there, or the broken bridges between mental health,
addiction and financial stability. So, like it was, we don't correlate those two often enough in our community.
There is a direct relationship between financial instability and mental health and addiction. We have a huge mental health crisis in this country that often gets ignored, and you see it exacerbated in large cities. Right if you live in a large city like New York City or Los Angeles. You may see evidence of mental health on the streets, and in some cases not all, but in some cases reflected to people who are homeless, and we're not addressing
that issue sufficiently. In states and cities around the country, Underserved communities, including low income neighborhoods and communities of color, disproportionately experience and what we call social determinants of health, and that really contributes to mental health challenges and addiction and financial instability. And if we're not really going to address the social determinants of health, it makes it a lot more difficult for people to get to that place
where they can be financially stable. And our communities face systemic barriers in addressing health care or accessing as you say, health care, accessing education, accessing employment opportunities, supportable housing. So, you know, folks often like to talk about mental health in a vacuum, but it has to be directly tied to healthcare, education, employment, and housing. If I can't afford an apartment, I'm more than likely won't be able to
sustain a job. And if I have a mental health challenge and it's not treated, that's going to affect my ability to get a job or to hold on to a home, and that perpetuates into a vicious cycle of poverty. So I had the privilege of helping to create an addiction treatment center in Los Angeles that was and remains
quite successful. And I think we need more of that work, and we need more focus on those areas because we tend to disaggregate them and think of poverty and mental health in one bucket and then financial stability in another.
Yeah, you've had an incredible story. I want to talk about a Flanso for a second, just the man, you know, the human Talk about mentorship that you've received, and you know, what are some of the most important lessons you've learned.
I've got the privilege of working with and for some incredible people who took the time to invest in me. And before I even talk about my professional life, I'll just talk about my family. Yeah, you know, my parents, my uncles, my aunts, my that have taken the time and continue to take the time to pour energy and love and attention into me and for me, and that serves as a foundation in a building block for creating
the person that I am today. You know, when folks say how did you get to this place, I often say, not by myself. And I didn't get here alone right If my parents were not and I used to call them dictators. If they were not such dictators in making sure that they pushed us to read and to write and to engage in different cultures and different languages, I wouldn't have the scope and the perspective that I have today.
And it wouldn't have led me to practice law. It wouldn't have led me to do the work that I've done. But when I got into those professional spaces, I also found people that invested in me. From Joanne Epps, who was the former dean of the Temple Law School where I went to law school, or to Clipper Scott Green, who was the judge that I clerked for, one of
the first black judges on the federal bench. And I clerked for him, and one of the things that he said to me that will always stick with me, he says, people often arrived at conclusions with too little evidence. And he said that to me in the early two thousands
when I clerked for him. And I think about that often, especially today in an environment where people reach conclusions based on a tweet without actually understanding the facts and drawing conclusions about marginalized communities that are in many cases faults. And that mentorship, in that sponsorship, over the decades that I've been doing this work, has really helped not only refer mind my approach and my thinking on a lot of the work that I do, but also my humanity.
You know, as we become more successful, it's very easy to forget where you come from. It's very easy to forget about the person who is less has less opportunities than you, because you're constantly moving forward and constantly reaching higher. And another mentor told me very early on, be careful who you are kind to on your way up. You
may meet them on your way down. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, And I often think about that ladder because we, yes, we have highs and lows in our lives, and we always have to think about the humanity that we that we exhibit in how we communicate with people, how we treat people, and how we live our lives.
I love that.
And you know, one of the things that your work makes me think about the humanity and DEI work and it's under attack today, and specifically I want to talk about having access to these opportunities like you know, I'm on a college board, I'm chair of the board at the at a university, and we're faced with you know, we can't even ask questions about you know, what's your background.
You know, when you talk about scholarshiping or donors who specifically designated their dollars for black students, we can't do that today. And that's across the country and in so many other places. Venture capital firms who were set up for black people are having challenges and doing this.
What do we do?
What do we do to ensure we still have you know, distribution channels for opportunity.
So I think there are a few things that we should do. First. I think we need to understand the landscape. That is the enough. What I mean by that is a permanive option in d and I exists for white people. It is called nepotism and it is called legacy.
Yeah. Yeah.
When I was in law school, Danny Reno, who was the former Attorney General, came and spoke about affirmative action, and she said, I am a product of affirmative action. Why because either her father or an uncle or someone knew someone at the university that she was ultimately accepted into and we don't call it affirmative action, but that's what it is. It is sanctioned nepotism and sanctioned promotional opportunities for those who are white or who are not black.
So let's understand the landscape. We need to understand that is nepotism and legacy, and that has existed for decades and continue to perpetuate this system of inequality. So that's first. Second, I think ensuring access to opportunities for historically underserved and marginalized groups requires advocacy. It requires policy reform, it requires community engagement, and it requires an ongoing commitment to the
principles that we call DNI. Right, so we have to make sure that we're willing to advocate for the idea of diversity, equity and inclusion, because what is the alternative. The alternative is that we are accepting institutions being non diverse and non inclusive, we are accepting workplaces being non diverse and non inclusive. We are accepting that we are less than Ultimately by refusing to commit to DNI and the principles undergirden DNI, what we're saying is that we're
less than and we know we're not right. We know we're not There is no reason why many of these boardrooms are not diverse. You can't tell me you cannot find a qualified black or brown person to serve on a board. You can't find a qualified black a brown person to serve as a CEO. You can't find a qualified black a brown person to work in your law firm.
So the advocacy, the policy performed, the community engagement, the ongoing commitment to D and I principles are incredibly important and understanding the landscape that nepotism is really another word for affirmative action. Legacy is another word for affirmative action, and we need to understand how all of those principles
coincide with the pushback that we're getting. Now. We're seeing that there's been a lot of progress or some progress in education, in business, in finance, and now it's being dismantled. And we have to fight against that dismantling of affirmative action, against D and I, against inclusive policies because they will directly affect all of us.
So it helped me make sense.
It is because if you look at qualified studies, you know if you have diverse people, you do better in business. Those are facts you make more money, which is what we are in the belief of like, that's what they want. They want to make more money, they want more power,
more influence. And so if I show you, businessman, business woman statistics that say you make more money when you have diverse boardrooms, you make more money when you have diverse rosters of staff, and then you still I don't want to I don't want to use the word hey, but do you really not like us that much that you are willing to make less to not put us at the table?
Well, I mean you pose the elephant in the room. That's the question. There's data that has been issued for decades. We have reports after report after report showing the business space for diversity, showing that if you have a diverse team, you're more successful. If you have a diverse team, you're more innovative, If you have a diverse team, you will
have a more sustainable bottom line over the long term. So, if I'm a business leader, or I'm assigning value, financial value to diversity, and if I'm not, then I either believe that black and brown people are lessening, or I'm willing to Negate or not, I'm willing to ignore the financial loss. I'm willing to ignore the financial loss that my company is going to experience as a result of
not embracing diversity. Wow. I mean that's how we should think about it, because no one is denying the studies. No one is saying the studies are wrong. And we're talking about Harvard Business School to Mackenzie, They've all issued studies showing the value of diversity to companies across the globe. And this is not just a US based issue. So if I'm a CEO and I ignore that, I either believe that black and brown people are less than or I'm willing to suffer financial lots.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, And and so I've had this conversation. This pot casts a lot, and I'm really interested in your take on this. So I there's there's two conversations to be had. One there is you can go to the Apples, the Googles, the Tesla's, the whatevers of the world and say you should hire more black people, et cetera, etcetera, etcetera.
Make that case.
I personally am not in. I want to build my own table. I'm not asking for a seat at nobody's table. I'm gonna go build my own table. And I recognize that there's value in both perspectives, in both efforts, And I just wonder what your thoughts are on those two things, right.
I think we need both and I think you're exactly right. Not every single person is an entrepreneur. Not every single person has what it takes to be an entrepreneur, to be your own boss, to worry about making payments to you know, pay corporate taxes four times a year. Not everyone has that.
I know you know what I'm talking about, right, But we.
Should all have the opportunity to explore the our interest in being an entrepreneur. So that's one. The flip side is that if we want to work for others, if we want to work in an environment that we don't own, we should also have the ability to do that. I mean, we arguably live in an economy, capitalist structure that's free enterprise, which is really fascinating to me. Those who are against
diversity and inclusion ostensibly support free enterprise. So if you support free enterprise in a capitalist structure, why you against d and I why are you pushing CEOs to move away from diversity? But at the same time say that you embrace free enterprise. You can't do both right. You either embrace pre enterprise and allow companies to create the structures that they deem most appropriate to achieve to advance
economic opportunity and the bottom line, or you don't. And so that's why I find this entire movement against D and I intellectually dishonored. It's not really about D and I. You know, this is about a fear of a minority majority district in a few years. This is about a fear of entrepreneurs getting to the point where they have so much in resources and access that you can't control them. And that's the larger narrative that we're fighting against me.
In the three minutes I got left, I got two more for you. So I one, I want to do this real. What is the imperative We have to find roads to success for the formerly incarcerated.
That is one of the most important things we need to do. Look, we all know the Rockefeller drug laws, the criminal justice laws that have been passed not only in the state of New York, but in other parts of the country disproportionately impacted people of color. We know and many people know how the sentencing structures were different if you had cocaine versus crack cocaine, right, and we know the impact that it had on communities of color.
With respect to those who are justice impacted, who are largely black and brown, when they are released, we have a responsibility to make sure that we open up opportunities for them. Otherwise we're simply perpetuating a cycle of mass
incarceration and disproportionately impacting our communities. When I was in the Governor's office, I worked on critical pieces of criminal justice reforms, from solitary confinement reforms to legislation to culturial courtail allowing minors to be treated as adults in prison. We called it raise the Age. And I just feel very strongly that, you know, the criminal justice system being what it is, we either believe in rehabilitation or we don't.
We either believe that people can go in, serve their time and be released and then serve as contributing members of society or and don't. And if we do, then we have to make sure we create an infrastructure to support them and that them are largely black and brown.
And the last one is, you know, obviously we having a humongous conversation about AI, and I wonder what concerns Alfonso about AI and what roads we have to solve whatever concerns is that you have, So a little bit of a two parter.
There for you.
I'm really concerned about AI because I think we often think of the challenges that AI presents, but we fail to think about the opportunities. And we need to think about the opportunities. Now. Now, when you think about the challenges that AI presents, we certainly know that in some industries, AI will result in eliminating those industries. So you think of language access as an example, right, you had companies
that were providing language access services. Well, pretty soon you will be able to and you can in many instances communicate on your phone in almost any language. So you may not need the same types of services that we
currently provide or have been providing. But at the same time, there are opportunities to expand access to financial services, There are opportunities to expand community development, There are opportunities to maximize technology, and we as black and brown people, should be looking for those opportunities not only to invest, but to create our businesses, right, because that is the future. I. You know, AI has been with us for a long time,
and many people say, what is this AI think? And I said, look at your phone series AI, and it's been there for a while. So as we think about technology for the future, I think it's important and imparative that we think of investments in this arena and we think about how we can take our resources and create businesses that can better serve our communities.
Black Tech Green Money is a production of Blavity Afro Tech from the Black Effect podcast Network in Nightheart Media.
It's produced by Morgan Debond and me Well Lucas, but the additional production support by Sarah Ergan and Love Beach.
Special thank you to Michael Davis and Kate McDonald. Learn more about my guests and other tech diswether. It's an innovator's at afrotech dot com. Enjoy your Black Tech Green Money, Share this with somebody. We'll get your money, peace and love. Check me out at the annual Black Effect Podcast Festival,
happening Saturday, April twenty seventh in Atlanta. Live podcasts are on deck from some of your favorite shows, including this one, Black Tech Green Money, and also some of the best podcasts in the game like Deeply Well with Debbie Brown and Carefully Reckless. Atlanta is one of my favorite cities in the world.
I lived there for two years.
Actually, in my worldview, seeing us successful in every industry and not having any limits on our potential largely was shaved by Atlanta.
To to be there with you doing this.
Podcast talking about how we build or leverage technology to bill wealth. Come on, man, doesn't get better. I want to see you there. Get your tickets today at black effect dot com. Backslash podcast fore Stavo