mr. maye welcome to washington journal. on your report, it begins in the post-civil war era, the era from reconstruction to civil rights. how do you describe the economic picture for black americans during that period? guest: it was very significant gains during reconstruction. black workers were seeing positive economic gains, but as we all know the implementation of jim crow legislation had walked back a lot of that progress during reconstruction. other discriminatory policies that were enacted during that time, including redlining and even when we think about the g.i. bill and how many black veterans were systemically excluded from the benefits of homeownership, those benefits, we see that the long casting shadow of economic inequity has its roots specifically during that time. >> the march -- host: the march on washington, what were the economic messages that dr. king and the other speakers were trying to get through to americans and american lawmakers? guest: the march on washington for jobs and freedom, a lot of the d

any comments, mr. maye. guest: i think to your cousin, and i think just maybe broadly to everyone is i think when we look at wealth, when we look at wages, when we look at all of the gaps, the disparities, it's really important, and i think even the intention of this report is to walk away from individualizing this. looking at one person or another person isn't the way we're going to actually make progress. and i think the purpose of even looking at these economic gaps over time is to see how pervasive the issue is and the issues that have been sustained from the 1960's until now. and looking at that, you can see that there are systemic and structural problems within these institutions, within institutions of education and within institutions of housing, and for sure within the economy and labor market. and in looking at a more macroview, a wider scope of the issue, we see we can't individualize these problems because these problems aren't just happening to, you know, a one off -- it's not a one off case and

host: mr. maye, any comments?r cousin, and may be broadly to everyone, i think when we look at wealth and we look at wages and we look at all of these gaps, these disparities, it is really important, and i think even the intention of this report is to walk away from individualizing this. looking at one person or another person is not the way we are going to actually make progress. the purpose of even looking at these economic gaps over time is to see how pervasive the issue is, and the issues that have been sustained from the 60's until now. looking at that, you can see that there are systemic and structural problems within these institutions of education, within institutions of housing, and for sure within the economy and labor market. i think in looking at a more macro view, a wider scope of the issue, we can't individualize these problems because these problems are not just happening -- it is not a one-off case. it is happening to people in middle america. it is happening to people on the east coast, west coast