BLACK TAX: WE CAN’T AVOID IT

Did everybody make it safe and sound out of the holiday season? Because girl, barely! I mean my heart, mind and soul were stitched together so beautifully just from being around my family and all of us focused on doing kind things for each other.

But my coins Sis? See, the problem with your girl is she’s an empath and a fixer – I am a sucker for a properly delivered sob story. I immediately toss on my cape (that I can’t afford) and get to work fixing people’s lives and very often to my own detriment.

Anyway, my coins didn’t enjoy a fate quite as heart warming as me spending time with my amazing family and this got me thinking about money and how it factors into our relationships with our families.

There’s a phrase now, used to explain the often unspoken requirement of you to give money to your family, and that phrase is ‘black tax’. The black is not a mistake – the belief is that it doesn’t pertain to white people (meh) but that’s a generational privilege discussion for another time.

So how black tax works is that you stand in the financial gap for your family and effectively inherit their debts. Although ‘black tax’ is so named as a result of originating among the Black (especially rural) community, the practice applies across cultures and races. It came about as a result of young professionals incurring the responsibility of helping to look after the family, particularly younger siblings. That’s daunting and something I personally have no interest in.

However, I do believe that even the criticism of this is something that goes against the fabric of our being as black people. I say this understanding full well that we aren’t a monolithic group but it bears saying.

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