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Good morning.
It wasn’t obvious that a virus from China carried by global jet setters would create tinderbox conditions for the worst race riots since the 1960s. But so it did. Perhaps one reason why: Black adults were more than twice as likely as whites to have been laid off or furloughed during the pandemic.
That’s the finding of a Fortune-SurveyMonkey poll taken late last month. The survey found 24% of black adults said they had lost their jobs, compared with 20% of Hispanic workers, 19% of Asian workers, and 11% of white workers. (Full poll results here.) Throw in a race-tinged police killing, and you have fire.
Racial unrest ended up dominating yesterday’s meeting of members of the Fortune CEO Initiative. Among those participating was Ryan Williams–a 32-year-old black entrepreneur who has built a technology-driven real estate investment platform called Cadre, which reportedly has a valuation of at least $800 million. The meeting was off the record, but Williams spoke with me afterwards.
“I could very well have been in that same position because of how I looked,” Williams said of George Floyd. “My professional accomplishments don’t matter that much at the end of the day.” Williams grew up in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, and said he had relatives who told stories of their experiences during the Jim Crow days. “Will I be able to tell my children and their children that the world they grow up in is more just? It hit me that we haven’t made that much progress.”
Williams applauded other CEOs for openly discussing the problem, but also called on them to take concrete actions. “Put in place immediate steps that increase diversity and inclusion at the table, actually make metrics related to diversity public, make your interviewing and hiring process public, and incentivize people off that,” he said. That may not prevent the next George Floyd, but “there is no one size fits all solution. There are going to be multiple paths that have to be invested in. As CEOs, one of the best things we can do is start with our own home.”
Separately, thanks to Bruce Simpson of McKinsey, our partner for the event, for surfacing this pertinent quote:
“There are decades when nothing happens; and there are weeks when decades happen.”
—Vladimir Lenin
This may be one of those weeks. More news below.
Alan Murray
@alansmurray
alan.murray@fortune.com
Editor’s note: This post was updated to clarify that it was Williams who grew up in Baton Rouge, and that Cadre’s valuation is north of $800 million, not its assets.
TOP NEWS
Digital tax
The U.S. has had enough of countries such as the U.K. and Brazil hitting its digital giants with new taxes, so it has initiated investigations into such moves. The result could be new punitive tariffs, as well as yet more heightening of trade tensions. U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer: "We are prepared to take all appropriate action to defend our businesses and workers against any such discrimination." Reuters
Google suit
Google has been hit with a class action lawsuit by people who accuse it of tracking them even when they are in Chrome's incognito mode. Google says it has always been upfront about the fact that browsing in this mode doesn't stop the collection of data about people's browsing activity—it just stops such information being saved to the user's browser or device. Fortune
China and WHO
Tight information controls and competition within the Chinese public health system led to delays in getting information on the novel coronavirus to the World Health Organization, according to an Associated Press report. In January, the WHO was publicly praising China for its response to the epidemic, but there was a lot of frustration behind the scenes. All in all, information could have come through a few weeks before it did, which might have helped to slow the outbreak. AP
Hong Kong
The British government says it will ease immigration rules for Hong Kong citizens, if mainland China imposes its national security law on Hong Kong as planned. Prime Minister Boris Johnson wrote in a South China Morning Post op-ed that the move would be "one of the biggest changes in our visa system in British history." And while on the subject, here's an explainer from Fortune's Eamon Barrett about how the U.S. reaction to that national security law may pan out. Fortune
AROUND THE WATER COOLER
Hello IPO
IPOs are happening again: Warner Music Group today; ZoomInfo Technologies tomorrow. All in all, there are five flotations happening this week, which seems set to be the biggest week for IPOs this year, so far. If they go well, more will likely follow—though don't expect a return to the robust times of last year. Wall Street Journal
Blackout Tuesday
Yesterday much of the music industry engaged in what was called Blackout Tuesday, with people changing their profile pictures and backgrounds to black boxes, in protest against racial injustice. The campaign was backed by the majors. It did have one notable problem: people were using the #BlackOutTuesday hashtag alongside the #BlackLivesMatter hashtag, meaning those searching for the latter term saw a sea of black boxes rather than the useful resources they were looking for. Fortune
Sweden coronavirus
Sweden's notoriously relaxed approach to combating the COVID-19 pandemic may not have been such a great idea, the man behind that approach has admitted. Epidemiologist Anders Tegnell: "If we were to encounter the same illness with the same knowledge that we have today, I think our response would land somewhere in between what Sweden did and what the rest of the world has done." Sweden, which declined to close restaurants, shops, gyms and schools, has one of the world's highest coronavirus death rates. Bloomberg
Fauci warning
Infectious diseases expert Anthony Fauci has warned that, if a coronavirus vaccine does appear, it may not provide long-term immunity. Fauci: "When you look at the history of coronaviruses, the common coronaviruses that cause the common cold, the reports in the literature are that the durability of immunity that’s protective ranges from three to six months to almost always less than a year." CNBC
This edition of CEO Daily was edited by David Meyer.
