Rolling Out

The modern-day incarnation of the California “gold rush” is here. The incremental decriminalization of marijuana in America has ignited a feverish “green rush” of highly-profitable cannabis businesses in the past few years.

In fact, the Wall Street Journal reports the burgeoning cannabis industry will haul in $130 billion annually by 2024, and businessmen like Jay-Z want in. Plus, he wants to bring along other Black people to ride this fiscal wave.

Born Shawn Carter, the New York-based music mogul announced he is launching a $10 million fund in order to attract other Blacks and minorities into this fledgling field.

“It’s really unbelievable how that can happen,” Jay-Z told the Journal. “We were the ones most negatively affected by the war on drugs, and America has turned around and created a business from it that’s worth billions.”

Jay is not the only one who notices the wicked irony that Americans are suddenly enriching themselves off a product that used to, and still does, send Blacks to prison for months and years.

California was the first to destigmatize cannabis through the legalization of medicinal marijuana. And as the industry continues its upward trajectory in growth, Jay-Z decries the barriers already erected to minority and Black people who also have to navigate the labyrinth of bylaws, regulations, taxes and other issues to try to get started.

Jay-Z has his own cannabis business line through his company Monogram. Separately, Hov created this $10M fund as a way to accelerate the process for ambitious Black businesspeople to get into the industry or grow their businesses.