David Henderson and Philip Magness:

Hulu’s se­ries “The 1619 Project” blames eco­nomic in­equal­ity be­tween blacks and whites on “racial cap­i­tal­ism.” But al­most every ex­am­ple pre­sented is the re­sult of gov­ern­ment poli­cies that, in pur­pose or ef­fect, dis­crim­i­nated against African-Amer­i­cans. “The 1619 Project” makes an un­in­ten­tional case for cap­i­tal­ism.

These and other gov­ern­ment poli­cies caused im­mense eco­nomic harm to African-Amer­i­cans. But they aren’t cap­i­tal­ism. They’re in­ter­ven­tions into mar­kets, state-sanc­tioned theft, and po­lit­i­cal pay­offs to seg­re­ga­tion­ists.

The an­swer to these prob­lems isn’t to place the bur­den on the mar­ket through repa­ra­tions. It’s to root out bad gov­ern­ment poli­cies that con­tinue, some­times un­in­ten­tion­ally, the long legacy of state-spon­sored racial dis­crim­i­na­tion. That would be a wor­thy 2023 project.