A shifting landscape for Black-owned businesses  

Each year, the Brookings Center for Community Uplift tracks changes in Black-owned employer businesses across U.S. metro areas through the Black Business Parity Dashboard, revealing both sustained growth and persistent ownership gaps.

Hannah Stephens and Andre Perry find that while these firms have expanded significantly—surpassing 200,000 businesses and generating a cumulative $249 billion in revenue in 2023 alone—they remain underrepresented relative to the Black population, underscoring how closing this gap could unlock substantial gains in jobs, wages, and economic growth nationwide.

Reforming corporate tax. Following recent reforms, the U.S. corporate tax has become a flawed hybrid system that distorts decisions, enables avoidance, and raises too little revenue. William Gale, Adam Looney, and Elena Patel propose completing the transition from an income tax to a cash-flow tax, which could raise over $4.7 trillion over 10 years.

Why the founders cared about trade and taxes. In the latest episode of Democracy in Question, host Katie Dunn Tenpas sat down with Kari Heerman and Vanessa Williamson for a conversation that draws a direct line from the founders’ grievances in 1776 to the tariff and tax policy decisions defining America today.

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