The racial wealth gap poses a significant challenge for the Black community, with the median Black household having only 32 cents of liquidity for every dollar held by the median white household. To overcome historical challenges and build a better future, entrepreneurship offers Black communities a way to create wealth. Moreover, it can be an influential tool for cultural and social impact. Black entrepreneurs who start their own businesses create products and services reflective of their experiences, serve community needs, and increase market representation and diversity.
Black-owned businesses are more likely to invest in their communities by buying, supplying, mentoring, training, and hiring from within. Empowering Black-owned businesses is crucial to creating long-lasting, positive change. These enterprises are not just engines of job creation and economic activity in their communities, but also a significant vehicle for building wealth for future generations.
To succeed, every business owner must be their own biggest advocate, have a mission-focused culture, stay up-to-date, leverage automation and data, be strategic in financing, seize opportunities, and have a long-term vision. At JPMorgan Chase, we support Black businesses and help them succeed through our five-year $30 billion racial equality initiative, which involves advancing diverse businesses and improving the lives of underrepresented individuals. Our initiative has already allocated over 50% of the capital towards resources and programs, such as 15,000 small business loans in majority Black and Hispanic/Latino communities, 100,000 preserved or newly developed affordable housing, $100 million invested in diversity-led MDI and CDFI, and Advancing Black Pathways.
We encourage Black business owners to contact their banking relationship team to learn more about how we can support them. To stay updated with commercial banking insights and news, sign up at the bottom of any page on our website and follow us on LinkedIn.