All of us at the Economic Policy Institute (EPI) are angered and deeply saddened by the police murder of George Floyd, and so many other senseless deaths in the Black community—incidents rooted in a long history of anti-Blackness in our nation.

This is a horrible moment for our nation—and a moment that challenges each of us to commit to lasting change.

The racism that led to these tragic and unnecessary deaths has also created tragic economic disparities between Black and white people in the United States, a reality that the pandemic has magnified and laid bare.

EPI’s staff knows this all too well. For more than 30 years, EPI researchers have used the tools of economic analysis and empirical research to expose the truth about the glaring and growing inequality in the United States impacting working families—disparities that are disproportionately experienced by Black people.

Exposing and understanding the root causes of the systemic racism, inequities, and injustice in the U.S. economy is a necessary precondition for developing, advocating for, and ultimately implementing policy solutions adequate to the scale and scope of the problem.

We have all been shaken by recent events, which are bound by a common thread of bigotry woven throughout U.S. history. We all know that derailing racism is the only way to ensure that all Black people are able to live the supposed American dream, not the American nightmare we are witnessing now.

—The Economic Policy Institute staff