Back in early May, the LA Times Opinion section asked readers to envision life in California after the pandemic and share their thoughts on what COVID-19 health and economic crisis reveals about us as a society, and what transformations may be necessary to the heal the trauma. More than 3700 readers responded, myself included. My response was included in the July 26, 2020, LA Times Sunday Edition: "Carolyn L. Baker was among a handful of readers who wrote before George Floyd

There was a time when Americans, specifically white Americans such as myself, eagerly supported government entitlement programs and had relatively no issue having a social safety net in place. Many of us from the suburbs like to think we got to where we are today by virtue of our merit, hard work, intelligence, pluck, and maybe a little luck. But it was America’s investment after World War II that created FHA home programs and later the Veterans Administration (VA), which bac