A Merger of (Potential) Might: Why Prairie View A&M and Texas Southern Should Combine Their Foundations to Challenge the Endowment Establishment

Posted on September 1, 2025 by | Leave a comment

It is reason, and not passion, which must guide our deliberations, guide our debate, and guide our decision. – Barbara Jordan

In the gilded halls of America’s elite universities, financial firepower is both a symbol and source of dominance. Endowments—the great silent engines of academia—determine not only which students get scholarships but which schools can recruit Nobel-calibre faculty, fund original research, and shape public policy. At the apex of this order stands UTIMCO, the University of Texas and Texas A&M’s investment juggernaut, with more than $70 billion under management. Below, far below, exist the undercapitalised yet ambitious Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs) of Texas.

Two of the state’s largest HBCUs—Prairie View A&M University (PVAMU) and Texas Southern University (TSU)—have long histories, loyal alumni, and vital missions. What they do not have is institutional wealth. PVAMU’s foundation reported a modest $1.83 million in net assets in 2022. TSU’s foundation, better capitalised, holds $22.7 million. Combined, that amounts to just $24.5 million. For comparison, Rice University, less than 50 miles from either campus, holds an endowment north of $7.8 billion.

That yawning disparity matters. But it also presents an opportunity: a merger of the two foundations into a single, more potent philanthropic and investment entity. Done properly, it could reorient how Black higher education competes—not by appealing to fairness or guilt, but through scale, strategy, and institutional force.

A Rebalancing Act

To understand the potential of a PVAMU-TSU foundation merger, one must first grasp the dynamics of university endowments. Large endowments benefit from economies of scale, granting them access to exclusive investment opportunities—private equity, venture capital, hedge funds—often unavailable to smaller players. They attract the best fund managers, demand lower fees, and can weather market volatility without compromising their missions. Small foundations, by contrast, tend to be conservatively invested, costly to manage per dollar, and too fragmented to punch above their weight.

A consolidated HBCU foundation in Texas would be small compared to UTIMCO, but large relative to its peers. With a $25 million corpus as a starting point, the new entity could position itself for growth by professionalising its investment strategy, adopting a more ambitious donor engagement plan, and forming partnerships with Black-owned banks, family offices, and community institutions. Call it the Texas Black Excellence Fund, or perhaps, more simply, the TexHBCU Endowment.

To be sure, the legal and logistical barriers to such a merger are real. Foundation boards guard their autonomy jealously. Alumni pride can turn parochial. Governance models would need careful negotiation to ensure representation and avoid turf wars. But the arguments in favour are compelling.

The Power of One

First, a merger would cut overhead. Legal, accounting, auditing, and compliance costs—duplicated today—could be streamlined. A joint fundraising apparatus could create a single point of entry for corporate partners and high-net-worth donors. Branding efforts would gain coherence: instead of competing for attention, the institutions would stand together as a symbol of Black institutional unity and strength.

Second, scale invites leverage. A $25 million foundation cannot change the world overnight, but it can attract co-investments, engage in pooled funds, and perhaps even launch a purpose-driven asset management firm in the model of UTIMCO. If successful, this would be the first Black-led institutional investor of serious size in Texas—capable not only of managing endowment funds but of influencing broader economic flows across Black Texas.

Third, the merger would send a strategic signal to policymakers and philanthropic networks. It would say, in effect: “We are no longer asking for permission to grow. We are building the engine ourselves.” That tone matters. Too often, HBCUs are framed as needing rescue. A merged foundation flips that narrative. It becomes an asset allocator, a market participant, a builder of capital rather than a petitioner of it.

UTIMCO: A Goliath in the Crosshairs?

No one expects a $25 million fund to challenge a $70 billion behemoth. But that is not the point. UTIMCO’s dominance is as much political as it is financial. Its influence flows from its role as gatekeeper to resources, shaping everything from campus architecture to graduate fellowships. The merged HBCU foundation would not dethrone UTIMCO—it would decentralise power by becoming a second pole.

Indeed, the comparison may inspire mimicry. Just as UTIMCO serves multiple institutions, so too could a joint HBCU foundation. Prairie View and Texas Southern are only the beginning. Over time, the model could scale to include other Black-serving institutions across Texas and the South. This would amplify investment impact and accelerate institutional wealth-building.

Moreover, such a foundation could adopt an unapologetically developmental investment strategy. Where UTIMCO optimises for returns, the TexHBCU fund could optimise for both returns and racial equity—by investing in Black entrepreneurs, affordable housing, climate-resilient infrastructure, or educational tech. The dual mandate—profit and purpose—would not be a hindrance but a hallmark.

Regional Stakes

Prairie View sits on a rural hilltop. Texas Southern sprawls in urban Houston. But their communities are deeply connected—culturally, economically, demographically. A combined foundation could create regional development strategies that go beyond scholarship aid.

Imagine a venture fund seeding Black-owned start-ups in Houston’s Third Ward. A real estate initiative turning vacant lots into mixed-income housing for PVAMU students and local residents. A workforce development fund retraining returning citizens for green jobs across both cities. Each dollar invested becomes more than a balance sheet entry; it becomes a force for transformation.

This matters not just to students and faculty, but to the broader Texas economy. Black Texans make up 13% of the state population but own less than 3% of its small businesses. Educational attainment gaps persist. Institutional neglect deepens. The merger would not fix all this—but it would give the community a new tool for shaping its destiny.

Copy, Then Paste

If the model works, it would not stay in Texas. Southern University in Louisiana has multiple campuses and foundations that could benefit from consolidation. So does the University System of Maryland’s HBCUs. Indeed, the entire sector could adopt a federated endowment strategy—unified in purpose but distributed in governance.

HBCUs have long suffered from institutional atomisation. They are asked to compete individually in a system that rewards consolidation. Merging foundations is not just a finance play—it is a strategy for survival and sovereignty.

The Alternative: Stagnation

Critics may say a merger is too ambitious. That it risks alumni backlash or donor confusion. That it could take years to execute. But delay is itself a cost. Each year the foundations remain separate is another year of opportunity lost. Another year where millions in potential returns go unrealised. Another year where larger institutions deepen their lead.

PVAMU and TSU have histories to be proud of. But institutional pride must not become institutional inertia. A merger is not surrender—it is evolution.

In the long arc of higher education, moments of boldness define legacy. This is one of those moments. Two foundations. One future. Let the uniting begin.

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Debt Fit for a Queen (and Her King): Why Beyoncé and Jay-Z’s $110 Million Mortgage Is a Lesson in Black Wealth Strategy

Posted on August 29, 2025 by | Leave a comment

“The wealthy don’t fear debt they master it. While others pay to own, they borrow to control.” — HBCU Money

In the hills of Bel Air, where the gates are high and the price of privacy even higher, a royal couple reigns not with crowns or thrones, but with compound interest, limited liability companies, and a mastery of capital structuring. This month, Beyoncé and Jay-Z made headlines again, not for a new album or tour, but for a second mortgage. The couple whose combined net worth now exceeds $3 billion, per Forbes secured an additional $57.8 million mortgage on their $88 million Bel Air estate. This raises their total mortgage debt on the property to $110.6 million. For many, it triggered confusion: Why would billionaires take out debt especially this much? They own the intellectual property rights to chart-topping albums, entire music catalogs, clothing lines, venture funds, and streaming services. They’re not short on liquidity. But for those fluent in institutional wealth-building, the move is textbook. It’s what banks do. What private equity does. What families like the Rockefellers, Rothschilds, and yes, now the Carters, do: they leverage good debt to expand their control over assets, preserve liquidity, and legally reduce taxes. As the headlines obsess over the couple’s $637,244 monthly burn rate including mortgage and property taxes we must step back and understand the real play at work.

The Structure of Power: Debt as a Wealth Instrument

There are two kinds of debt in America, debt you drown in, and debt you climb on. The former is predatory and suffocating: payday loans, credit card interest, subprime mortgages. The latter is engineered and liberating: investment real estate, operating capital, bridge financing. This second category, good debt is what powers Wall Street, Silicon Valley, and, increasingly, the portfolios of Black billionaires. When Beyoncé and Jay-Z financed their Bel Air estate rather than pay in cash, it wasn’t a lack of funds it was a maximization of strategy. With interest rates still historically low by long-term standards, the effective cost of borrowing is cheaper than the opportunity cost of deploying equity elsewhere. That $110 million in borrowed capital is likely earning multiples elsewhere in touring infrastructure, private equity ventures, tech startups, and, of course, real estate. The Carter empire does not rely on liquidating assets to make acquisitions. It builds on leverage, like any institution should.

Cash Is King, Debt Is the Horse It Rides

Jay-Z once rapped, “I’m not a businessman. I’m a business, man.” And that business understands that cash flow is oxygen. In a high-inflation, high-yield environment, holding liquidity is more valuable than owning a paid-off house in Bel Air. Let’s model it simply:

  • Suppose the couple borrowed $110 million at a 3.5% interest rate.
  • The annual cost is approximately $3.85 million.
  • That same $110 million deployed into touring, film production, or venture investments yielding 10% generates $11 million annually.

Net result? Over $7 million in arbitrage.

This is how institutions think. Not in terms of how much they “own,” but in how much capital they control and multiply. African American families and institutions should take note: Being debt-free is not synonymous with being economically powerful. Control, not ownership alone, is the more sophisticated metric of power.

The Bel Air Property: Trophy or Tool?

It’s tempting to dismiss the Bel Air estate as just another status symbol, a personal flex. But that’s the wrong lens.

For the Carters, real estate like music catalogs, business equity, and IP is a balance sheet line item. This home, aside from its lifestyle function, serves several institutional purposes:

  1. Collateralization – The home is a high-value, appreciating asset. It anchors future lending.
  2. Credit Enhancement – With reliable payment performance, it increases the couple’s access to cheap capital.
  3. Tax Optimization – Interest payments on a mortgage of this type can be partially deducted, even under current tax caps.

Moreover, the couple reportedly pays $100,343 monthly in property taxes, more than the annual income of the median U.S. household. But again, context matters. Their global income and asset base far outpace such obligations, and that property tax provides further tax deduction possibilities depending on structure.

A Note to the Emerging Class: Institutional Thinking Required

The divide in America today is less about income and more about how wealth thinks. Many African American households are still taught to see debt as something to eliminate completely often because of the trauma associated with its misuse. The wealth class, by contrast, uses debt as a financial tool.

The Carters didn’t get here by mistake. Their trajectory offers lessons that should be taught in HBCU finance classrooms and African American family wealth summits alike:

  • Leverage is not a vice if it is structured.
  • A mortgage is not debt when the return exceeds the cost.
  • Liquidity is more powerful than ownership in times of economic opportunity.
  • Institutions survive because they think beyond the personal.

This is especially important for HBCU alumni and African American families looking to build dynastic wealth. Too often, debt is only associated with student loans and credit cards. Rarely is it discussed as an accelerant for asset acquisition, tax minimization, or capital scaling.

Building the Empire: What the Rest of Us Can Learn

You don’t need a Bel Air zip code to think like an institution. The Carter model can be scaled:

  1. Buy Investment Property
    Use mortgage debt to buy a duplex, triplex, or quadplex where tenants cover your mortgage and generate passive income.
  2. Preserve Your Capital
    Avoid putting 100% down on assets. Leverage 20–30% and maintain the rest for emergencies or investments.
  3. Learn the Tax Code
    Understand how to deduct interest, depreciate properties, and structure your finances to reduce liability legally.
  4. Think Generationally
    Set up trusts, LLCs, and estate plans. Don’t just buy for today—structure for tomorrow.
  5. Teach the Next Generation
    Share strategies at the dinner table. Incorporate wealth-building into family conversations and HBCU alumni networks.

From Debt-Averse to Debt-Aware: A Cultural Pivot

For African America, there must be a shift from being debt-averse to being debt-aware. Not reckless, but informed. Not afraid, but empowered. Beyoncé and Jay-Z’s move may make for juicy tabloid fodder, but the real story is about capital strategy. With every refinance, with every debt restructuring, they’re deepening their institutional footprint. We often praise their performances, their music, their style. But perhaps we should spend more time studying their moves not just on stage, but on paper. Their empire isn’t built on vibes it’s built on vehicles, vision, and valuation strategy.

The Carter Codex

The narrative shouldn’t be, “Beyoncé and Jay-Z are spending $637,000 a month.” It should be, “Beyoncé and Jay-Z have leveraged a property to unlock hundreds of millions in investment capital while maintaining their lifestyle and optimizing their taxes.” That’s the story HBCU students in finance departments should be analyzing. That’s the story African American financial advisors should be breaking down. That’s the story Black families gathering for holiday dinners should be dissecting. Because wealth isn’t what you show it’s what you can withstand, what you can structure, and what you can scale. In a country that often denies African America the full benefits of capitalism, the Carter family is rewriting the playbook. Not with debt as a burden. But with debt as a bridge.

Disclaimer: This article was assisted by ChatGPT.

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The Gridiron Mirage: Debunking the NFL as the Engine of African American Wealth

Posted on August 26, 2025 by | Leave a comment

“A lot of enslaved people actually made money, but they had no power.” – William Rhoden

In the annals of American mythology, few institutions occupy as outsized a symbolic role in African American economic advancement as the National Football League. It is a league awash in spectacle and saturated with the rhetoric of opportunity. “The NFL has made more African American millionaires than any other institution,” say its defenders. This refrain—recited with patriotic pride or cynical resignation—has come to function as a social truism, a talisman held up to justify the nation’s meager investments in structural equity. But like most myths, its repetition does not make it true.

This article contends that this notion is not only false but insidious. It misrepresents the scale and structure of wealth in the African American community, diverts attention from more potent engines of generational prosperity, and masks the extractive and precarious nature of professional sports as a vehicle for wealth creation. The NFL is not a wealth escalator; it is, at best, a short-lived income spurt machine for a statistical elite, and at worst, a cultural and physical treadmill leading back to zero.

Gridiron Arithmetic: The Numbers Game

The first fallacy is numerical. As of the 2023 season, there were approximately 1,696 active NFL players spread across 32 teams. Around 58% of these players identified as African American, or roughly 984 athletes. Even when one accounts for the extended rosters, practice squads, and recent retirees still living off their earnings, the figure remains marginal—perhaps a few thousand men across multiple generations.

Contrast this with sectors such as healthcare, education, government, and business. The National Black MBA Association alone counts tens of thousands of members, many of whom have built sustainable wealth through entrepreneurship, investment, or corporate ascendancy. African American doctors number over 50,000. Black-owned businesses, according to the U.S. Census Bureau, exceed 140,000 with paid employees, and millions more operate as sole proprietorships.

The American Bar Association reports over 50,000 African American attorneys. Even the public sector, often decried as slow or bureaucratic, employs hundreds of thousands of Black professionals across local, state, and federal levels. These occupations, while lacking the glamour of a touchdown, generate far more stable, scalable, and generationally transferrable wealth.

Income vs. Wealth: The Shaky Foundations of NFL Riches

To understand the illusion, one must disentangle income from wealth. Wealth is not what one earns; it is what one owns. It is the portfolio, the property, the equity stake, the passive income stream, and, perhaps most critically, the ability to transfer resources across generations. NFL players earn substantial salaries during their brief careers—an average of $2.7 million per year, though the median is closer to $860,000. But careers are short, averaging just 3.3 years.

This creates what economists call a “high burn rate, low accumulation” profile. Studies have found that 15% of NFL players file for bankruptcy within 12 years of retirement, despite millions in earnings. Others do not go bankrupt but live in quiet precarity, reduced to local celebrity gigs and motivational speaking to sustain a post-football identity. The 2022 National Bureau of Economic Research paper “Bankruptcy Rates among NFL Players with Short-Lived Income” confirms this vulnerability, showing how the lack of financial literacy, support systems, and institutional guidance leads to dissipation rather than accumulation.

Meanwhile, wealth in America is driven by ownership: of businesses, real estate, stocks, and institutions. The NFL offers none of these to the vast majority of its Black athletes. Ownership, it must be said, remains the exclusive domain of white billionaires. As of 2025, there are zero majority African American owners of NFL franchises. While the NBA has made token strides—see Michael Jordan’s brief tenure as majority owner of the Charlotte Hornets—the NFL remains rigid in its old-world capital structure.

The Plantation Paradigm: Extraction, Not Empowerment

It is hard to avoid the uncomfortable metaphor that the NFL structurally resembles a modern-day plantation. African American bodies fuel the labor force, endure the risks, suffer the injuries, and entertain the masses. White ownership, white commissioners, and white-centered media conglomerates reap the institutional profits. The league generates $18 billion in annual revenue. The average team is valued at $5 billion. And yet, the athletes, even at the apex of their earning power, remain labor, not capital.

This is not a critique of sports per se. Athletics can inspire and galvanize. But the mythologizing of football as a viable strategy for racial uplift is akin to mistaking a single rainstorm for an irrigation system. The commodification of Black excellence in a space so structurally white in ownership and control cannot plausibly be the foundation for true economic emancipation.

This is made all the more clear by examining the fates of even the most successful. Players like Vince Young, who signed a $26 million contract and ended up broke, or Warren Sapp, who earned $82 million only to file for bankruptcy, are cautionary tales. Exceptions like LeBron James, who has parlayed his brand into equity ownerships and venture capital, are held up as archetypes. But these are aberrations, not templates. And they are not NFL stories.

The Opportunity Cost of Myth-Making

Perhaps the greatest harm of the “NFL creates millionaires” myth is opportunity cost. It distorts the allocation of attention, aspiration, and investment within the African American community. While youth in other demographics are taught to pursue STEM, financial literacy, or entrepreneurship, too many African American boys are sold a lottery ticket disguised as a profession. A 2021 study by the Journal of Black Studies found that African American adolescent males are 40 times more likely to aspire to a professional sports career than to become an engineer or entrepreneur.

This has ramifications far beyond the individual. It weakens pipelines to industries that are scalable, recession-resistant, and foundational to intergenerational wealth. No serious community-wide wealth can be built on the shoulders of 53-man rosters. Nor can economic independence arise from dependency on one of the most exploitative and physically damaging professions in modern labor.

There are also societal consequences. The overrepresentation of African Americans in professional sports distorts public perception. It fosters the narrative that “Black people are doing fine” because a few are seen in Super Bowl commercials or luxury car ads. It becomes a justification for denying systemic reform, funding cutbacks to HBCUs, or underinvestment in majority-Black schools. “Why do they need help?” ask the indifferent. “They have the NFL.”

Institutional Power vs Individual Stardom

In the game of wealth, institutions win. The NFL is an institution—one whose structure benefits its owners and media affiliates. The real wealth in sports lies not in being a player but in being an owner, a broadcaster, a media rights holder, or a licensed merchandiser. It lies in being Robert Kraft, not the running back who suffers a concussion under his ownership.

African American wealth building must shift its focus toward institutions that compound, aggregate, and replicate power. HBCUs, Black-owned banks, cooperative land trusts, investment syndicates, media companies, and technology accelerators are more viable pathways to collective advancement than any draft pick. Consider that a single Black-owned private equity fund managing $500 million will produce more Black millionaires than five decades of NFL careers.

In fact, historical analogues suggest that professional exclusion led to the construction of powerful Black institutions. During segregation, African Americans built hospitals, universities, bus lines, and newspapers. These were incubators of both economic and cultural power. In today’s integrationist fantasy, too many of these have been sacrificed in favor of proximity to elite white institutions—like the NFL—that will never relinquish true control.

The Global Lens: Transnational Wealth Thinking

Moreover, the fixation on domestic sports ignores the global economic realignment. The world’s fastest-growing wealth markets are in Africa, Asia, and Latin America. Forward-thinking African Americans should be exporting services, partnering with Pan-African institutions, and investing in sovereign wealth opportunities. Yet, the “NFL as savior” narrative keeps too many tethered to a narrow, provincial idea of success.

The NFL does not build factories. It does not fund innovation. It does not seed capital. It does not provide passive income. It does not own land, develop cities, or engage in infrastructure. It sells tickets. It sells ads. It breaks bodies. It builds billion-dollar stadiums on taxpayer subsidies and pays its workers less than hedge fund interns.

Real wealth is built through scale and succession. The Black farmer who owns 1,000 acres and passes it down is more transformative than the Pro Bowler whose children inherit post-career medical bills and reality show royalties.

Toward a New Narrative: Wealth Without Injury

African American communities need new wealth myths—ones grounded in fact, finance, and future orientation. The idea that the NFL is a pinnacle of Black achievement should be retired. In its place must come narratives about investment clubs, fintech startups, regenerative agriculture, urban development, and cooperative real estate ventures.

Educational institutions and cultural gatekeepers have a responsibility here. Public school counselors, pastors, and media platforms should deglamorize the sports-to-riches narrative and illuminate more durable paths. Foundations and philanthropies should invest not in football camps, but in coding bootcamps, maker spaces, and entrepreneurship labs.

Policy must evolve, too. Tax incentives should reward community ownership and capital retention. States should support Black-owned banks the way they support stadium construction. Reparations conversations should be about equity stakes, not honorary jerseys.

The NFL is not evil. It is, however, a business. And like all businesses, it is designed to maximize returns for its investors—not to solve racial inequality. The sooner we disabuse ourselves of the myth that it is a wealth escalator, the sooner we can begin the real work of building wealth—wealth that endures beyond the roar of the crowd, the flicker of the lights, or the brevity of a three-season career.

Trading Helmets for Holdings

In conclusion, the NFL is a distraction, not a development strategy. It is a parade, not a pipeline. It is a pageant of athletic excellence exploited for institutional enrichment. And it is a cultural sedative—one that soothes legitimate anger over systemic inequality with the spectacle of a few lucky gladiators.

The real revolution will not be televised on Monday Night Football. It will be written in balance sheets, ownership ledgers, and multi-generational trusts. African Americans must trade the helmet for holdings, the franchise tag for franchise ownership, and the myth of athletic salvation for the measured, compound reality of institutional power.

That is not as thrilling as a fourth-quarter comeback. But it is the only way to win the long game.

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For Paying College Athletes? Yes, Then Cut The High School Athletes A Check Too

Posted on August 22, 2025 by | Leave a comment

By William A. Foster, IV

“When hypocrisy is a character trait, it also affects one’s thinking, because it consists in the negation of all the aspects of reality that one finds disagreeable, irrational or repugnant.” – Octavio Paz

My freshman year of high school was nerve wracking and exciting. As far as academics were concerned I did fairly well that first year, but the football field was where I was most excited. I had a good year and heard rumblings that the varsity head coach had me in consideration for varsity my coming sophomore year. I fit his system of defense. I was small, but I had good football IQ and did not mind taking or giving a hit. All of that changed though when he got fired at the end of my freshman year for using an ineligible player during the year and having to forfeit almost all of the school’s games. In his place came a coach I was familiar with because the year before me and father went to see Jack Yates High School, the high school I grew up watching my father coach play in the state playoffs take on Temple High School and the offensive coordinator would then become our school’s head coach. I was excited, but nervous. They ran a different brand of football. We had been a predominantly running team and our talent fit that style. Instead, he ran an early version of the spread that was not very popular throughout. We were built for ground and pound and he wanted an air attack. I was switched positions from defense to offense and scored the first touchdown of the new regime, and from there it was all down hill.

By my junior year, I was deep into my academics and this was becoming a problem unbeknownst to me for my coaches. It would come to a head when I asked for more time before practice to get tutoring and one of my coaches said to me, “Son, you need to choose between them books and this team.” I would never forget that moment. I was shocked. I had parents who were college professors. Choose? Is he serious? Not only was he, but it would escalate. After our game that week, which I did not have a particularly good one and little did I know it was really the end of my football career. As we sat and watched game film the next week a play that I missed came up. The coach stopped the film, flipped on the lights, and looked dead at me and said to the team, “We have some players who are not committed to this team.” Being the hot tempered teenager I was at the time, I calmly put my head down as if I was rubbing it with one finger. I will let you guess which one. From that point on, I was in the dog house and at the end of the season was told to turn my equipment in. My father would talk me back onto the team for my senior year, but quite honestly it was hell and part of me wish I had never gone through it. I loved football growing up, playing in the street, watching my father coach, going to the state championship, and thought one day that would be me. Little did I understand, the “business” I was walking into.

Texas high school football is different. There is no doubt about that and Friday NIght Lights probably left more than a few things out that would traumatize people. I for one recall getting pulled over one night after drinking and in no condition to be behind a wheel, but once the police found out I played for the local high school team they were more interested in telling me about them playing for the police football team. Ultimately, they let me go with a minor in possession and let me drive myself home. On my high school football team we had some of everything going on from the drug dealers, drug users, massive illiteracy, and more than a few things I have blocked from my memory for good reason.

You see most of them were not just playing football for the love of the game. They were playing because they saw it as their only way out. Many of my teammates came from impoverished backgrounds, with few educational opportunities and even fewer economic ones. For them, football was not just a pastime it was a potential career. And yet, despite the immense pressure placed on high school athletes to perform, there is virtually no financial compensation for their efforts. If we are going to argue that college athletes deserve to be paid for their labor, then high school athletes who also generate millions of dollars in revenue deserve the same consideration.

The financial power of high school football, especially in states like Texas, is undeniable. According to a 2019 report by the Texas Education Agency, the state spent over $500 million on high school football stadiums between 2008 and 2018. Some stadiums rival those of small colleges in both size and amenities, with the most expensive high school stadium in the country, Legacy Stadium in Katy, Texas costing $72 million to build. These stadiums are packed on Friday nights, bringing in millions of dollars in ticket sales, sponsorships, and media rights.

Despite this, the players on the field, the ones drawing the crowds see none of this revenue. While their coaches earn six-figure salaries (the highest-paid high school coach in Texas makes $158,000 per year), the athletes themselves play for free, risking injury and sacrificing their time and education in the hopes of making it to the next level.

The physical toll on high school athletes is just as severe as it is for college players. According to a study by the National Federation of State High School Associations (NFHS), there are approximately 1.1 million high school football players in the U.S., and every year, an estimated 300,000 sports-related concussions occur among high school athletes. The risk of serious, long-term injury is real, yet these players receive no compensation for putting their bodies on the line.

Consider this: the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) has been pressured to provide financial assistance for athletes suffering from chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE), a brain disease caused by repeated head trauma. If college athletes deserve compensation for these risks, shouldn’t high school athletes who are just as vulnerable also receive financial protection?

Some may argue that high school sports do not generate as much money as college athletics. While it is true that high schools do not have billion-dollar TV contracts like the NCAA, local revenue generation is still significant. The Texas University Interscholastic League (UIL) collects millions of dollars in revenue from the state football championships, including ticket sales, sponsorships, and broadcasting rights. ESPN, Fox Sports, and other major networks regularly feature high school games, and Nike and Adidas have begun sponsoring elite high school programs.

In 2021, Alabama’s Hoover High School reported earning over $2 million annually from its football program. Southlake Carroll High School in Texas made nearly $1.5 million in a single season from ticket sales, donations, and sponsorships. The bottom line? High school football is not just a game it is a business. And in any other business, the labor force gets paid.

The NCAA’s decision to allow Name, Image, and Likeness (NIL) deals for college athletes has already set a precedent. High school athletes in several states including Texas, California, and Florida are now allowed to profit from their NIL rights. Players like Jaden Rashada, a high school quarterback in California, reportedly signed a $9.5 million NIL deal before ever playing a college snap. This demonstrates that high school athletes do, in fact, have market value.

But what about the majority of players who will never receive NIL deals? They are still sacrificing their time, bodies, and educational opportunities for the sport. If coaches, administrators, and organizations profit from their efforts, then why should the athletes themselves be excluded? A stipend, medical coverage, or even a trust fund for players who complete their high school careers would be a step in the right direction.

Critics argue that paying high school athletes could open the door to corruption, recruiting scandals, and financial mismanagement. However, these problems already exist in amateur sports. Boosters have been caught illegally paying recruits for decades, and schools have been sanctioned for bending the rules to secure top talent. If anything, formalizing a compensation structure would bring transparency to a system that already operates in the shadows.

Others worry about the financial burden on school districts. However, if schools can afford multi-million-dollar stadiums and six-figure coaching salaries, then they can find ways to fairly compensate athletes. The money is already there but the question is who gets to benefit from it.

The reality is that high school football is more than just a game. It is an industry, one that generates millions of dollars while placing tremendous physical and mental demands on young athletes. If we accept the argument that college athletes should be paid because of the revenue they generate, then we must apply that same logic to high school athletes.

High school athletes do more than just entertain. They fill stadiums, drive merchandise sales, and fuel an economy that benefits everyone except them. It is time to acknowledge their worth and compensate them accordingly. Whether through stipends, medical coverage, or NIL opportunities, high school athletes deserve to see a share of the wealth they help create. Otherwise, we continue to exploit their labor under the guise of “amateurism.” The system is broken, and until high school athletes get a piece of the pie, it will remain unfairly rigged against them.

 Disclaimer: This article was assisted by ChatGPT.

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The Political Assault on Lisa D. Cook: Why the Fed’s Only HBCU Alum Faces an Outsized Storm

Posted on August 21, 2025 by | Leave a comment

“You can not win a war that you will not acknowledge you are in, and African America refuses to acknowledge it is in a war and therefore has not built the institutional defense necessary to win.” – William A. Foster, IV

The latest calls for Federal Reserve Governor Lisa D. Cook to resign reveal less about her alleged financial entanglements and more about the precarious place of African American excellence in America’s institutional hierarchy. Cook, an alum of Spelman College—the jewel of the Atlanta University Center—sits as the only Historically Black College and University graduate in the Federal Reserve’s history. Her very presence at the central bank represents a seismic shift in the composition of economic policymaking. It also explains why she has become a lightning rod for partisan attacks.

On August 20, 2025, Donald Trump posted on Truth Social: “Cook must resign, now!!!!” The demand followed remarks from Bill Pulte, the Trump-appointed Director of the Federal Housing Finance Agency, who urged the Department of Justice to probe Cook’s role in allegedly questionable mortgages. What might otherwise be dismissed as yet another skirmish in Washington’s perpetual political warfare assumes broader significance when one considers who Cook is, what she represents, and what she symbolizes to African American institutions.

Lisa Cook’s rise to the Federal Reserve Board of Governors in May 2022 marked a watershed moment. For over a century, the Fed had been populated by a homogenous cadre of policymakers—almost exclusively White men with Ivy League or equivalent pedigrees. Cook, a Black woman educated at Spelman College, Oxford, and the University of California, Berkeley, carved a path through both racial and gendered barriers that have long defined the economics profession. Her scholarship is well known in academic circles: her pioneering work on the relationship between racial violence and African American innovation remains a cornerstone of economic history. By quantifying how lynching and Jim Crow violence curtailed patent activity by African Americans, she exposed a structural mechanism by which systemic racism suppressed not just Black lives but also Black wealth creation. At the Fed, she carried this analytical rigor into debates on labor markets, innovation, and most recently, the economic implications of artificial intelligence. For African America, her appointment was not just symbolic. It was strategic. HBCU graduates have long been overrepresented in producing the nation’s Black professionals—doctors, lawyers, judges, engineers. But in macroeconomic governance, their footprint has been virtually nonexistent. Cook’s ascension offered a foothold in one of the world’s most powerful institutions, where decisions reverberate across global markets, shape credit availability, and indirectly determine whether African American households can access affordable mortgages, student loans, and capital for small businesses.

The ferocity of the attacks against Cook cannot be divorced from her identity. The allegations hinge on supposed mortgage irregularities, amplified by Pulte and weaponized by Trump. Yet, even before these accusations, Cook faced resistance. Her Senate confirmation was one of the narrowest in Fed history, with Republicans uniformly opposed and some explicitly questioning her “fitness” for monetary policy on the grounds that her academic research leaned too heavily into racial economics. This rhetorical sleight-of-hand—dismissing racialized economic analysis as political—is a familiar tactic. It seeks to delegitimize the very work that challenges the dominant narrative. Cook’s critics often sidestep her publications in American Economic Review or her leadership within the American Economic Association, preferring instead to cast her as a “diversity appointment.” The current calls for her resignation escalate this narrative. To remove Cook under a cloud of controversy would not just eliminate a Fed governor. It would roll back the fragile gains of HBCU institutional representation in elite economic policymaking. It would signal, once again, that African American advancement is conditional, fragile, and always subject to reversal.

It is important to situate these attacks in a wider political economy. Trump’s demand is not only about Cook. It is about control of the Federal Reserve itself. The central bank has become increasingly politicized in recent years, with Republicans casting inflation and interest rate policy as partisan issues. To force out Cook would not only weaken President Biden’s appointees but also demoralize constituencies who view her as a critical voice for equity in macroeconomic policy. The Fed has traditionally projected itself as a technocratic, apolitical institution. Yet this veneer has cracked. Appointments are now battlefield contests. Cook’s vulnerability demonstrates that while America’s institutions have formally opened their doors to HBCU graduates, they have not yet fortified protections against political weaponization. This dynamic mirrors a historical pattern. African Americans who rise into positions of structural authority—whether judges, regulators, or corporate executives—often find themselves targets of disproportionate scrutiny. The goal is not merely to unseat them but to delegitimize the institutions that empowered them.

HBCUs stand uniquely implicated in this episode. Spelman College, Cook’s alma mater, is one of the leading producers of Black women in economics and STEM. Yet, despite their track record, HBCUs remain underfunded relative to predominantly White institutions. Cook’s ascent to the Fed was a triumph for the HBCU ecosystem, proof that institutional excellence could translate into influence at the very highest levels. That triumph is now under attack. If Cook were to resign or be forced out under pressure, it would reverberate across HBCUs. It would reinforce perceptions that HBCU alumni, even at their most accomplished, remain vulnerable to political takedowns. For African American students pursuing economics at Howard, Morehouse, or North Carolina A&T, the message would be chilling: success does not guarantee security. From an institutional development standpoint, the HBCU community must interpret this not as an isolated incident but as a case study in institutional fragility. Without strong networks of advocacy, media response, and financial backing, HBCU alumni who enter elite spaces will continue to stand exposed.

Cook’s potential ouster matters beyond symbolism. At a time when the Federal Reserve is grappling with questions of inflation persistence, labor market dynamics, and the disruptive potential of artificial intelligence, her perspective is invaluable. She has consistently foregrounded the idea that innovation is not distributed equally and that policy must account for structural barriers to participation. In her July 2025 speech at the National Bureau of Economic Research, Cook warned that generative AI could entrench inequality if its benefits accrued only to a narrow segment of firms and workers. This perspective matters because it forces the Fed to grapple with the distributional consequences of macroeconomic shifts, not just aggregate averages. Her departure would narrow the intellectual diversity of the Fed at precisely the moment it most needs heterodox insights.

What then must be the response of African American institutions—HBCUs, banks, think tanks, chambers of commerce? Silence cannot be an option. Cook’s defense should not be left to partisan politicians alone. Instead, a coordinated institutional defense is required, one that frames this attack not just as an assault on an individual but as an assault on African American institutional legitimacy. African American-owned banks could highlight the importance of a Fed governor who understands the structural barriers to credit access in Black communities. HBCU presidents could jointly issue statements defending the integrity of their alumna and reminding the public of their role in producing top-tier economists. Think tanks could produce rapid-response analyses showing the economic costs of underrepresentation in monetary policy. The lesson is clear: individual success must be buttressed by institutional power. Without that scaffolding, every Lisa Cook who rises will remain vulnerable to political storms.

Ultimately, the attack on Lisa Cook exemplifies America’s struggle with inclusion at the highest levels of institutional power. It is not enough to allow “firsts” to break through. True inclusion requires protecting them from disproportionate scrutiny, ensuring that they can govern with the same presumption of competence afforded to their peers. For African America, Cook’s ordeal is a reminder that victories in representation must be consolidated by institutional strategy. HBCUs cannot rest on symbolic triumphs; they must translate them into sustained influence, advocacy, and resilience. Otherwise, every gain risks being undone at the first sign of political backlash.

Lisa D. Cook stands at a crossroads. Her presence at the Federal Reserve is not simply about her credentials, which are unimpeachable. It is about what she represents: the intellectual capacity of HBCUs, the resilience of African American scholarship, and the potential for inclusive economic governance. The calls for her resignation are not neutral. They are part of a larger contest over who gets to shape America’s financial architecture. If African American institutions fail to rally, Cook may become another cautionary tale of progress reversed. But if they respond with clarity and force, this moment could mark the beginning of a new era—one in which HBCU alumni are not just present in elite institutions but are protected by a scaffolding of institutional power equal to the challenges they face. Her fate, in many ways, is a referendum on whether African America can defend its foothold in the commanding heights of global economic governance.

Disclaimer: This article was assisted by ChatGPT.

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