Kendra: [00:00:00] The views shared in this episode represent Kelli and Kendra, not our mamas, partners, church, job, or sponsors.

Kelli: Hi y'all. This is Kelli King Jackson and Kendra Ross, and welcome to this episode of our podcast, This Woman is Swerve. We are glad to have you here.

Kendra: Kelli Kell. 

Kelli: Hey Kendra Ross. How are you? Well, I mean, I know it's been a day. It's been a day. 

Kendra: Yeah. I'm in my, I want to like move to a beach or to the country and read and write era. But I'm cool. What'd it do? [00:01:00]

Kelli: Oh, um, it do ending gearing up to in quarter three. So lots of. All the things, uh, planning for 2025, people starting to do their budgets, contracts, all that.

So it's just a lot of administrative stuff, which is not my favorite activity. So. 

Kendra: Yeah. Gratefully, you're very, well, at least compared to me, you're super organized.

Kelli: I mean, I also have an assistant. So I think all executives should have an assistant. 

Kendra: Yeah, but that's a whole nother story for another time. I don't understand.

Kelli: Yeah, I think we talk, we, we phase out jobs that we actually need. Yeah, technology can do a lot of things, but it can't do the human interaction that's needed. And it doesn't always get nuanced, so yeah. [00:02:00]

Kendra: You know, nuance is my word. Nuance. I think the lack of nuance across the board, among humans, is why technology can only go so far.

Like, folks don't understand nuance, and that's where we are. I mean, there's other reasons why we are where we are, but I think not being able to have nuanced conversations and nuanced perspectives is is if we can only feed the machine what we feed the machine so 

Kelli: yep and it's only smart is the people who gave it the food anyway 

Kendra: so this is a this is a off off cycle moment but just thought we talk a little bit about one of our like follow up kind of like as we end the podcast we bring up another subject i'm like whoa whoa whoa whoa that could be a whole podcast in Um, and we don't necessarily need to do a whole podcast or anything, but one of the group chat items that came up in one of our recent episodes was around the [00:03:00] black tax.

Speaker: I think I'm just, I'm still adjusting. Like, you know, I'm taking care of my household now. So I clearly something has shifted, but it doesn't feel like it. 

Kendra: I think everybody wrestles to a certain extent. If you're at a certain level, you can make 50, 000 a year and still be subject to the black tax. It just shows up differently for different people.

You may be directly taking care of your household. Somebody else may be sending money for a cousin to go to college. Somebody else may be taking in their sister's child because, you know, they lost their way. You know, you can be taking care of parents, but the black tax is real for everybody. Don't be fooled.

Everybody, even people who come from old money, there's, there's, there's somebody there who, and, and quite frankly, the black tax is not just the black tax. It's a whole nother conversation about what it means to, to, to hold a certain level of privilege and how you have to show up for other people who may not be in your [00:04:00] immediate village.

And if you don't do that, then it's kind of white supremacist. That 

Kelli: will be another episode of the podcast, The Black Tax.

Um, we are here today to talk a little bit about the Black Tax. Um, we mentioned it at the tail end of one of our Previous episodes and wanted to come back and spend a little bit of time digging into the conversation. So I remember several years ago, Melissa Harris Perry was at a, um, Black philanthropy conference and talked about the costs and she had actually quantified it.

And I've never been able to find her talk online, but I just want to say that the black tax is so [00:05:00]pervasive. for us that I think we often forget how we are impacted by inequities in our day to day life. 

Kendra: Absolutely. And this is something that even before Kelli and I had the language for, like we've been talking about it for years.

And like, recognizing that we were like, participating in what we call the Black Tags, even before we had anything to, to distribute, you know what I mean? Yeah. It is like par for the course, um, coming from particular kinds of families and backgrounds. Um, the more I talk to people, you know, I, I find it, um, very, uh, common amongst lots of groups of people who are not European.

Yeah. 

Kelli: Yeah. Yep. 

Kendra: And I'll leave it at that. 

Kelli: Yeah, no, no, it's real, right? I, I hear white folks talk all the time. Well, I had to pull myself up and I had to work and I had to put myself through school. Absolutely. I had to put myself through school. I was also [00:06:00] underpaid as a black woman and I had to send money home to support my family.

Right? Like it is, I don't know many non white folks. I mean, I, I don't, I don't know many white folks who've had that shared experience. I know some. But not many, right? And so when we talk about the black text, it's a really about this compounded experience that we're having that has significant implications when it comes to our ability to generate wealth and to be able to, um, to live the lives that match our education level and match our work ethic.

Kendra: Absolutely. And, and just to preface, like, I've experienced the black tax on multiple sides, right? Like I've been the receiver of what you call the black tax. Uh, you know, um, I'm even thinking early on about the fact that my grandparents. a lot of anything, but I always looked at them as like having a lot because it gave so much.[00:07:00]

Like my, my grandparents, you know, particularly my dad's mom, my grandma Jean used to buy me and my brother's Easter clothes every year. My grandparents on both sides and my aunts and uncles on both sides took me and my brother in for the summer. And when we were with them, They fed us, they clothed us. Um, when I was in college, you know, my grandparents who were retired and on a fixed income used to send me care packages.

My brother, my grandfather sent my little brother 100 a week for the entire time. My brother was an undergrad and my brother was undergrad for almost six years, five and a half years. I mean, he did an extra grad year so he could coach, but. My grandpa said, as long as you in school, you gonna get your pizza money.

And people never really talk about that as the black tax, but it is because we, we needed the village to get, to get through. And so the reason why the black tax is something that I actively participate in because I know, but for, [00:08:00] My grandparents on both sides and my aunts and uncles and quite frankly, family, friends, my mom's friends and people like that that used to make sure that we ate when everybody else say if we were in big groups of people and I was like, we don't have money to go out to eat.

Well, I'll take one kid and you take the other kid, you know, to me. So sometimes the black tax is like kind of communal cooperative living, but where it gets. Tricky is when you are the one, you are one or two that have been perceived to have made it. Yeah. That's where the black tags really kicks in. And then other folks look to you as like, and, and quite frankly, it's not always other folks looking to you.

Sometimes you put that onus on yourself. Yeah. And I know that's me. 

Kelli: Yeah. We, sometimes we get this, uh, the savior complex that we got to come in and fix it and help everybody. And sometimes people default to, of course, Kelli's gonna do that because Kelli got it. And I'm like, you don't know what my bank account looking like, right?

Like you, you, you don't know. And so [00:09:00] I did, I had to get to a point where I had to accept that if I kept helping people the way that I was financially supporting them, that I wasn't ever going to have a savings account. I was never going to learn how. To manage money and like make money grow. And it has been really painful trying to say, I can't do that.

Even if I have it air quotes, like I can't, because if I keep doing it, I'm not going to have what I need to be able to show up in a, like a life or death emergency or for myself as I want to retire and not work until I'm 80. So it does bring with it a lot of survivor's guilt. In addition to like just how our Ego and bourgeoisie shows up when we jump in to, to help folks.

Absolutely. And 

Kendra: so also to stay, stay for the record, I enjoy helping to support my nieces and nephews and family members like [00:10:00] that. Cause I do not have children. And for me, that's, that's a joy for me. So when I do that, that I don't really account for that in the same way, because it's not like most time, 99 percent of the time, no one has asked me for anything.

I'm just like, Oh, I get to participate in this. I get to participate in making sure my nieces and nephews have what they need for their senior year, for their college tours, for prom, you know. Get to go to concerts they want to go to. Like, that is a joy for me. Where it can be pressure points sometimes, where it's like, you're getting like, in the midnight hour calls from family members or friends who are, you know, who, and you do have to make tough decisions.

It's like, like you said, air quotes, you've got it. But if you got that, there's something else you don't got. Yeah. Right? And I've definitely, definitely been wrestling with that. And so the way I've kind of accounted for, especially in this, like, season of, like, the past, I would say, 18 months, where I've taken my finances far more seriously than I ever have.

I actually signed up for a financial, um, planning advisor. [00:11:00] Thing online that, that I picked up from my, you know, my, my, my dude, Ramit Sethi, who I listened to all the time. Um, and when the, when the financial planner told me how much they felt that I should be able to save a month. And I was like, Oh, snap.

And I'm like, the reason why I'm not able to do that is because I'm accounting for my budget. Like somebody is going to need help. I need to have this. And I'm okay with that.

What bothers me is not whether I have it or not, is what bothers me is like, sometimes how it comes about. It's like, and I try really hard not to be like. Uh, have that, like, patriarchal view, like, I can tell somebody what they could be doing better. Mm hmm. Because, you know, I, I can't Oh, I've been there.

I've done that. Yeah, because, but, because sometimes it's, there's a lot of other things at play and Mm hmm. Five minutes ago, I could have, I was them, you know what I mean? Like, absolutely. I was robbing Peter to pay Paul at some point. 

Kelli: Yeah. And the black tax brings a lot of shame, right? Like we don't talk about capitalism and how [00:12:00] it makes it hard for folks to meet their basic needs.

But then when someone needs help, like sometimes they feel embarrassed, sometimes you feel frustrated, but we don't name capitalism as the problem, right? We then go to the individual and individual behavior, which is how I think capitalism is. And classism shows up in our individual lives. And so I've really had to unpack that because I did, I remember those moments where I was like, well, you, you, you getting your nails done.

And I'm like, I sound like the people on the, on the, uh, what's his name? Dave Ramsey and all the, all the old school finance shows. Right. And so. I feel like I have grown, but it was really hard for me to really wrestle with that for a while. 

Kendra: Yeah, I can't deal with any of those fun As soon as I hear a glimpse of shame, I can't do it.

Now, Rami is hard on people. He'll be like, he'll be like, are you listening to yourself? And [00:13:00]he'll be like, he was like, okay, let's see where this comes from. How, what, what was your, what were your parents doing with money? I can deal with that. I cannot deal with the, like the, like you said, the Dave Ramsey and M shame Susie Orman telling people you ain't ish.

If you ain't got 10 million saved, I don't, I don't have that to do. And I, and I agree with you. I've definitely been there. Now I do think that there are like, what I've tried to do was like talk through people through the psychology of it or like to say like, listen, I'm not trying to judge you, but I wanted to say this, what you're saying doesn't make sense.

That in fact, you cannot pay me back next week, because if you do, you're going to be right back to where you were. Right. 

Kelli: Yeah. You can't, 

Kendra: you're just going to go from, from whole to whole, Peter to Paul, back to Peter and back to Paul. 

Kelli: Yeah. 

Kendra: Um, and so sometimes I'll just share my two cents lovingly, but I do think that there is a, a slippery slope with that.

And sometimes, you know, It's not just capitalism, but as a white supremacist, Protestant ethic, come on somebody. 

Kelli: Yeah. Meritocracy. If you [00:14:00] work hard, you'll make, you'll figure it out. And yes, people do figure out how to resolve their own material conditions a lot of the time, but sometimes people just need support.

And you know, I, when I, when I'm able, I do my best to try to show up for that, but I did have to set some boundaries around it for my own sanity and peace of mind. But I, you know, I'm curious for folks, you know, if this is resonating and how you've experienced the black tax, um, Kendra and I can definitely share some links of podcasts and books that we've been listening to, as we've been trying to figure out, like, how do we hold this?

nuance, um, more tenderly and also give ourselves the opportunity to become debt free, to pay off student loans, to pay our own, our homes without having a mortgage. Like we aspire to have those things too. And so, um, I do think that we're collectively on a journey to learn more about [00:15:00]how to be in this system, but not let the system overtake 

Kendra: us.

Absolutely. I really appreciate you wrapping it up that way. And I would just say this, that like the shame doesn't just lie on the side of people who like may have the need. Um, although that happens and poverty is a killer and shame is a killer and it can really rot at people's being. But also on my end, I've dealt with shame a lot for saying like, okay, you've been making good money the past couple of years.

What do you have to show for it? You know what I mean? And so then I shame myself. And then I remember if I didn't do this, this, this, this, this, this, I would have this, this, this, this, and this, and my student loans would be pay off. And then I go down the spiral and I'm like, I refuse to do that anymore. So I do think that like wrestling with the psychology of money that is impacted by capitalism, that is impacted by white supremacy is something that needs to be discussed more and that we, to your point, have to have a nuanced conversation.

It can't be. You know, if you ask, it can't be like the back, it can't be like, never give money to your family or friends again, because we won't survive like that, [00:16:00] but it just has to look, it has to make sense. Yeah. Because we do, we do deserve to like, to have a retirement. We do. We do deserve not to work till 70.

Kelli: We do. Yeah. And you know, I'll, I'll spice it up before we wrap up. You know, there's a young influencer that was on Tik TOK. Um, who recently was complaining about having to send Money home to her family and that she didn't like that part of her African heritage and they came for her. Right. So I do think that, you know, we have young folks who, um, they, they're feeling the pressure and they may not always express it in the ways that we appreciate as more seasoned leaders.

But I think that, you know, I understand their frustration. I just didn't have TikTok at the time. To say it out loud. And so [00:17:00] I remember being 23, sending money home and what I was probably feeling on the inside, I didn't have an online platform to verbalize it. So I'm grateful for that because they would have come from me too.

Kendra: Yeah. Yeah. Well, I say, leave it at that. And I'll just say my, my final feeling is that. I love being able to help and support my family because that, to me, that's part of why I do all the stuff that I do. Um, and I want to continue to do that. But I want to feel good about, I want to feel abundant. I want to feel good about what I'm doing with my life.

I want to feel good about how I'm accumulating resources. I want to feel good about how I'm just, how I'm like distributing and thinking about how I spend my resources. Um, and that's some work. A lot of that has to do with my own internal work and has nothing to do with anything that anybody has ever asked me for ever I've ever given.

Kelli: Yeah. And so my savings is back where I'm happy with it. Uh, I can't help nobody do nothing.[00:18:00] And that is a Black text, uh, that I, I have to sit with, um, and, and be okay with the boundary for what it is right now. 

Kendra: And for the record, I just, at my big age, I'll be 49 this year, I just, Two weeks ago, got my student loans to the point where they're not six figures and they still had five figures, but I'm taking the win.

Um, and I'm working with people who never had student loans. I'm working with people who have more in their 401k than I do in their half my age. So I struggle with the other side of the black tax. They were like, what if and how, uh, being a black woman from a certain background, I had to, you know, The miles I had to climb to get where I am.

Um, to me, that's all connected to the black tax too. 

Kelli: Thanks for listening. I hope we will see you in the group chat and let us know what you think.

Kendra: I wish we could license 

Kelli: get 

Kendra: [00:19:00] money. You know, biggie is always appropriate. I'm sure there's gotta be like a, a beat somewhere out there with some like horrible, like music, elevator music version.