Today's inner city youth has been hijacked by a "thug culture," says John Hope Bryant, CEO of Operation Hope and the Bryant Group Companies.
"These urban city kids, who are aspirational, are not seeing brothers in suits or guys like you who are professionals," Bryant told Steve Malzberg on
Newsmax TV.
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"They're seeing rap stars, athletes and drug dealers. Why anybody is surprised that that's who they grow up wanting to be? A drug dealer who's successful is not dumb, they're just misguided.
"They understand import, export, finance, marketing, wholesale retail and logistics. These are really brilliant, adjacent kids with bad role models, a crappy environment, a horrible self-esteem, a lack of hope and no business plan."
Bryant — author of the new book,
"How the Poor Can Save Capitalism: Rebuilding the Path to the Middle Class," published by Berrett-Koehler — said it is essential the warped social model be changed.
"Essentially, these kids have been hijacked by thug culture. We've made dumb sexy in this country. We've dumbed down and celebrated it."
One solution is the creation of the HOPE Business in a Box Academies, which provide courses in "financial literacy and financial dignity linked with a primer course in entrepreneurship."
"You go through a course in financial literacy, the language of money, a course in entrepreneurship. Twenty five businesses you can start with $500 or less," he Bryant said.
"Think 'Shark Tank' for kids, and they have two minutes to pitch their idea because life is short and it includes judges. When they win, the kid gets up to $500 to fund their business, but the money has to go into a bank account.
"We're going to do that in 2,000 public schools in America and that will change the ecosystem and the environment in these schools and with the kids you're talking about."
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