No sooner were the Jim Crow laws repealed, than the depletion of the middle class started (e.g., Sam Harris "Failure of Meritocracy" for the data). Ergo, just as the race-based legal and cultural barriers were removed, financial barriers of all kinds were erected to attainment of a middle class life. On the surface, this might look like continued oppression based on race; a deeper look reveals that it has become substantially harder for anyone to rise to the middle class, regardless of race. At best (and I mean at BEST), what is going on now is a distraction: we need a broad expansion of opportunity and access to resources accross the board -- precisely the kind of thing MLK called for just before he was shot. Universal basic income, affordable housing and healthcare, free quality education at all levels -- along with other things like prison and police reform -- are the kinds of things that will solve this. As I once said to a friend, you can desegregate the lunch counter, but ...