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Massachusetts is less than a week away from lifting its remaining COVID-19 businesses restrictions. But even as companies emerge from more than a year of immense losses and pandemic-induced rules, leaders in the local Black business community aren’t looking forward to a return to normal.
“Normal sucked; it wasn’t good for us,” says Samuel Gebru, the director of policy and public affairs for the Black Economic Council of Massachusetts.
That the Black community faced stunning economic disparities — in the Boston area and across the country — well before the pandemic due to historic discriminatory policies was no secret. But it holds ever more true for minority entrepreneurs; according to a report by The Boston Foundation last week, Black and Latino business owners were far less likely receive debt financing or access loans needed for their companies, in addition to being hardest hit by the pandemic.