By Megan Sayles,
AFRO Business Writer,
msayles@afro.com
Ticker tapes, whether mechanical or electronic, have long been used to transmit real-time financial information about the stock market, like stock prices and trading volume. Traders and investors rely on them to monitor market movements and to make informed decisions about buying, selling or holding securities.
Now, Charles Walker, founder and CEO of Friends of the Movement (FotM) Global, has invented a new kind of ticker tape, the Conscious Spending Ticker (CST). The tool was designed to hold corporate America accountable for their commitments to fight racism and discrimination and to encourage consumers to spend with intentionality.
The first CST is known as the Black Wall Street Ticker. It tracks and reports spending, giving and investing by Black and allied consumers and companies with Black-owned businesses.
“We were able to put together cutting-edge technology that would allow us to track spending in the Black community with Black businesses. We can also analyze spending by category, whether it’s Asian, Latinx or LGBTQ, to gauge reciprocity between communities,” said Walker. “We have allies out there. Instead of leveraging the $1.7 trillion we spend, we want to leverage almost half of America’s spending to bring swift social and economic change.”
The Black Wall Street Ticker, which is being piloted in Atlanta, is powered by FotM Global’s Digital Voter Wallet. The app promotes conscious spending by enabling users to identify companies that align with their values and prioritize racial justice. It aims to persuade people to “vote” with their wallets.
Walker believes African Americans spend less money with Black-owned businesses than other ethnic groups spend with businesses owned by members of their same group. He thinks the legacy of slavery has caused Black people to envy one another’s success at times.
However, Walker said as more attention is given to Black history and Black excellence there’s been a resurgence in the importance of unity among African Americans.
“The more we learn, the more we wake up to systemic racism. When we wake up and start demanding change, we see what’s occurring in modern day, which is that people want to reverse all of our gains,” said Walker. “If we really want to change and make an impact, yes, we should vote, but we must also vote with our wallets.”
Ron Sailor, Southeast regional director of the National Action Network, said he was particularly inspired by Walker’s work because it’s rooted in Martin Luther King Jr.’s focus on the economic empowerment of Black people. Walker, himself, has been heavily involved in civil rights groups, like the NAACP, Southern Christian Leadership Conference and the Rainbow PUSH Coalition.
Sailor also pointed out that FotM Global’s mission relates to what civil rights activist the Rev. Jesse L. Jackson called “silver rights.”
“The spending of our dollars has caused large-scale success in almost any major American corporation. It is the infusion of these dollars freely spent from African-American communities that has led to this kind of corporate success,” said Sailor. “There must be a degree of mutual responsibility.”
He thinks the Black Wall Street Ticker is particularly important today as diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) efforts are under siege. Last June, the Supreme Court voted to end affirmative action in college admissions, outlawing the consideration of race in applications. The decision has engendered legal uncertainty for companies that promote DEI in their recruiting and hiring practices.
Firms like the Fearless Fund, which provides venture capital to businesses led by women of color, have also come under legal scrutiny.
“In the face of DEI attacks, this movement from Dr. Walker becomes increasingly important because it gives us a tangible and practical technology that we can use to definitively show where we are in the parity of these relationships between the Black and corporate community,” said Sailor.
Megan Sayles is a Report For America corps member.
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