Here is an article about it from NBC: https://www.nbcnews.com/business/consumer/bank-america-zero-down-payment-mortgage-first-time-buyers-details-rcna45662

A fundamental tenet of Men's Rights is that we all deserve to be treated as equals. Often on this sub, we focus on gendered issues, but the same is true for all issues of identity such as race and religion. I feel it is my responsibility to stand against any policy that systemically oppresses any man. We don't stop until ALL of us have rights.

With that in mind, I have very mixed feelings about the loan program described in the article. The program is a response to a practice called Redlining, for which banks refused loan services to non-white individuals attempting to purchase houses in certain neighborhoods. The practice was widespread until around 1980, but the most recent lawsuits concerning the practice were settled in 2015, so it's not ancient history.

In fact, though I'm only 35 years old, I grew up in a family that was a victim of Redlining. We lived in a neighborhood that was 95% black despite the fact that African Americans only compromise 13% of the US population. Over the years, the home values of the surrounding areas skyrocketed in comparison to ours.

I strongly feel that corporations that benefitted from illegal and immoral acts should be responsible for fixing the damage that they caused. Therefore, opening a loan program to the people that were not eligible for the loan previously seems like an egalitarian solution on the surface. But there are some problems with it.

The loan is open to Black and Latinos. But that does not mean they were effected by Redlining. If a person became a citizen yesterday, they would be qualified for this loan despite being unimpacted by the issues that created it. I am not opposed to immigrants receiving the same benefits that all of us receive, but I can't see any justifiable reason that they and their children should benefit from special programs that aren't available to all of us.

This is worse though. It is only open to first time borrowers, which means the people actually impacted by Redlining get nothing.

I am also concerned that these loans may become predatory. Higher down payments and closing costs result in lower interest payments. They also have the latent function of proving the borrower is capable of managing money to pay the loan back. I can easily imagine people screaming for a bailout after - surprise surprise - turns out they couldn't afford the loan after all.

Race based benefits are a blunt instrument to solve systemic problems. But is that the only solution? It's unlikely that mortgage applications would have been retained for more than 10 years. The impact of discrimination continues to have real harm to men in the US and it needs to be fixed.

So I guess the question is - Are race based policies like this one better than nothing? Or is there another way to make men equal?