Ghana in Focus: UK Black --- Why Ghanaians and Afrikans MUST STOP sending money home

This week's episode of Ghana in Focus introduces a new segment called UK Black.  We explore topics affecting the Ghanaian/Afrikan diaspora.  In this first episode we tackle a controversial subject, sending money back home or as it has become known as the Black tax . The so‑called black tax—monthly transfers to parents, siblings, extended family, or shared projects—emerges from a noble ethic of communal care. Yet the reality on the ground in the UK, US, Canada, and across Europe has shifted. Costs have surged since 2020, wages have lagged, and diaspora households are absorbing rent, transport, energy, food, and childcare increases at once. When expectations back home remain fixed while living costs in host countries skyrocket, the outcome is stress, burnout, and shrinking savings that erode any path to financial stability.

At its core, black tax is not a policy but a social contract: success is shared, not individual. Many of us were raised to see progress as a collective victory that must be repaid. There is also history behind this—colonial underdevelopment, stalled local opportunity, and the absence of intergenerational wealth. Diaspora earnings can feel like a bridge over those structural gaps. But bridges must rest on firm foundations. If the sender is juggling two or three jobs, missing their children’s bedtimes, and still dipping into credit to wire £200 home, the bridge is cracking. 

We analyse that In places like London, New York, and Toronto, rent consumes frightening shares of take-home pay. Add transport fares that approach a weekly food bill, energy costs that doubled, and the fixed band of council tax or local rates. Even £100,000 in London can feel thin once rent, utilities, and commuting are paid. For workers earning £40–60k—a common range for many in the diaspora—net pay often barely covers essentials. The maths gets tighter if you tithe, support kids, or pursue a part-time qualification to advance your career. Each transfer home may be an act of love, but repeated monthly, it becomes a plan that quietly cancels your future plans.

None of this argues against generosity. It argues against automaticity. Replace unexamined monthly remittances with transparent, time‑bound agreements linked to verifiable outcomes. Prioritise stabilising the sender household first: build a three‑month emergency fund, clear high‑interest debt, and put a standing order into a long-term investment vehicle. If support is still needed, schedule it quarterly and cap it at a sustainable percentage of net income.   We end by stating that although sending money beck home is commendable, times have changed and Europe and America is not  what it used to be!!

Chapters

• 0:00 New Series: Black UK Launch
• 2:00 Topic Setup And Listener Actions
• 4:00 Defining The Black Tax
• 7:30 Cultural Roots And Expectations
• 10:30 Real Lives: Burnout And Guilt
• 14:45 Misconceptions About Wealth In The West
• 19:30 Cost Of Living Breakdown
• 28:30 Rents Across Global Cities
• 35:30 Everyday Expenses Add Up

Transcript

SPEAKER_01: 0:04

Welcome to this week's edition of Ghana in Focus with myself Kwame, uh Ghanaian writer, journalist, broadcaster, podcast, and entrepreneur. And this this edition of Ghana in Focus is special. We are looking today at the first new series called Black UK. So this will be telling you about uh information and also how uh uh certain things are affecting African people, black people in the UK. And today's topic is why Africans should stop sending money back home. And this includes Ghanaians, yep. So rather the controversial topic for today, this first edition of UK Black, where we'll be looking at issues affecting uh Africans in the diaspora, whether Ghanaian, Nigerian, Zimbabwean, Kenyan, etc. Uh, so we'll be doing it every quarter unless we get some interesting topics for to discuss. So the next one will be after Christmas, and we'll be talking about uh black people and the police. But for this edition of UK Black encompassing Ghanaian focus, we are looking at why the time has come now for Ghanaians and other Africans in the Daspora to stop sending money back home. Controversial, but I'll tell you why. So before we get into the topic, uh just to let you know that if you like what you hear, please share to your friends, uh your family, uh social media networks. Subscribe to Ghana African Fix on YouTube. Hit the notification bell. YouTube will notify you every time we upload a new podcast. Similarly, subscribe to Ghana African Fix on Spotify. Uh look out for that on Spotify. Uh, click the follow button, and Spotify will notify you each and every time we upload new podcasts. All right, and if you want to donate to the show uh to help us uh continue to bring some fantastic content from Ghana and from the African content, you can donate as little as three US dollars a month. It could be a one-off payment or on a month of payment. So if to donate, we accept donations. So uh I'll leave the link in the footnote to the show where you can uh donate three US dollars a month. And if you want to uh do business in Ghana, you want to uh come on holiday in Ghana, you want to know where to go, where to where to see, then we do offer a consulting service whereby we can tailor make a package for you, look at your needs and wants, and then give you advice or assign post you to some agencies in Ghana that we know who will make your uh visit or your relocation to Ghana a smooth landing. So I'll leave you my email address and you can book your concession with myself. And we charge 30 URL for an hour or 20 UR dollars for a half-hour biving session. Okay, so um let's get into this week's um podcast. Like I said, the first in a new series within Ghana in Focus called UK Black, looking about issues affecting Ghanaians and other Africans in the diaspora. And this week is a very, very controversial subject: why Ghanaians and other Africans should stop sending money back home. Okay, it's often called the black tax. So we're gonna tell you why. Um, with facts, not emotion, yeah. So please, you know, don't put your emotions in it. We're gonna give you facts as to why, for me personally, you know, uh Ghanaians and other Africans should stop sending money back to Ghana or back to their uh countries of origin. All right, so what is the term the black tax when it comes to uh Africans in the diaspora? So black tax in the diaspora it refers to um financial obligations that many Africans professionals feel towards supporting family and community back home. Yeah, so often, often, yeah, this um sacrifice is a sacrifice that many Africans are making to their families back home, is at the cost of their own personal savings, investments, or even mental well-being. Now, you know, the concept is especially relevant for particularly first generation migrants from Africa or the Caribbean who you know have come to the UK. So let's take a deeper look at this issue about black tax. Yeah, so like I said, black tax is not a government levy, yeah. However, it's like you, whether you're Ghanaian or Nigerian or whatever, you're putting you working in the UK, you're putting some money aside every month, be it 200 pounds, 200, 200 euros, uh to send money back home to support either your parents, siblings, extended family, or even projects. So you may want you maybe build a house in Ghana, maybe build a house in Nigeria, and you want to send money uh back home to complete that particular project. Now, within this, um you know, uh sending money back to Ghana or all parts of the African continent, some of that money is for common expenses. So paying school fees for your siblings or cousins, uh covering medical bills for elderly relatives, funding, as I mentioned, home construction or even buying land in Ghana or Nigeria or wherever, and then supporting family businesses or emergencies. So many Africans in the UK, US, Canada, or Europe, rightly or wrongly, are seen as success stories, yeah, and are expected to help those back home. Yeah. So the perception is that, you know, in many African countries, be it Ghana, Nigeria, Kenya, Zimbabwe, that, you know, when you when you come to the West, right, you've made it, yeah, because the perception is Europe and North America, yeah, or the West is a land of milk and honey. And like I said before, and we'll go deep into this as well, that the West now is not a land of milk and honey. Yeah, it's not like it was 20, 25, or even 30 years ago, when you know the cost of living was good in the um the West, and also, you know, uh this even salaries were pretty good compared to what they are now. So, you know, this um narrative or misconception that many in Ghana and many in Africa have, that those of us that live in the West have made it and the success is far, far, far from the truth. If I told if if you if if many Ghanaians here and other Africans, if they knew how people are struggling in London or New York or Toronto or Paris or Berlin, yeah, just to bring money home, just to bring even 100 pounds home every month, right?$100 every month, right? You wouldn't be saying that because I know for a fact that in London, yeah, many Africans work free jobs just to make it meet in London. But I'll come, I'll come deeper to that in a minute. Also, there's a burden, yeah. So many Africans, many of us Africans that live in in the West, right, we have to juggle high living costs, right? Yeah, in the UK or US or Canada, which I come on to later, we're sending money back home to family, yeah. And there's also pressure to buy land and also get a property because many Africans dream of owning or building their own homes in Ghana or Africa, an African country, whereby so when they get old, they can just retire and move into the house that they spent maybe 20 years to build. Yeah. Now, this black tax of sending money home, it can also have an emotional um, you could say, toll on many Africans because you know it leads to guilt if money's not sent time. You can create a burnout for yourself because, like I said, I know a lot of Africans in London who work three jobs. They don't see their children at night, yeah, when they come home from school because they're working. They wake up in the morning. Let me give you an example of what I'm saying about burnout. Yeah, so many Ghanaians, Nigerians, Zimbabweans, Kenyan, Sierra Lone, Gambians, yeah, living in London. They wake up about three or four in the morning. This is before the children wake up, yeah. They go to their first job. Maybe it's cleaning in the office. Yeah. They do that for about three or four hours. Yeah. Then they get to the main job, which could be working in a factory, yeah. And that's it, for that, and that could be from let's say, you know, uh 10 in you know, in the morning to say, you know, 6 p.m. at night. Yeah. So you do eight hours in the factory, you know, working in the factory. After that, they may do a couple of hours security, yeah, or do some more cleaning afterwards. So they may do some more cleaning between eight and ten. So that's or between seven and ten. So when they finish at six, they've only got an hour to get from one part of London to another part of London and do the cleaning job for maybe from seven to ten. So by the time they get home, you're looking about probably nearly midnight. They don't see the children. The children going to bed, they don't see their children. They're doing this six days a week. They probably time they get raised on Sunday, and even that, they have to get the church and what have you, and also pay church tithes. So if it's creating burnout with the many Africans in London who feel some kind of emotion to send money back to their family, yeah, to their family or their siblings. So, you know, people need to understand, yeah. But before I get to that point, there's also, you could say, there's also like a cultural route or historical legacy as to why people send money back home. So in many African cultures, right, communal responsibility is sacred, success is shared, not individual. So, unlike the West, where people think individually, in Africa, we think collectively, such as the Ubuntu principle. I am because we are, because I am because they were. So if they're saying that if only for your parents, right, you will not have had the opportunity to come to Europe, right? So you have or come to the West. So you have responsibility now that you're in the West and are getting a decent job, to be able to send money back home to your parents who brought you into this world and helped you, you know, sacrifice for you to come to Europe. Yeah, it's also a colonial aftermath in terms of this whole issue to do with um sending money back home. So because of enslavement, colonialism, and neo-colonialism, this created systemic inequality among African people in their own country. That also left many families without generational wealth. Yeah, and generational wealth, just in a nutshell, is say your great-grandmother passed wealth to her, to your grandmother, and your grandmother passed the phone to your mother, and your mother passed wealth to you. That is what we call generational wealth, yeah? But that's for another time. I can I can go into that deeper in another time. So, this is why that's borrowed support is essential because of the systemic inequality and impoverishment that many families, you know, can only struggle with in countries like Ghana, Nigeria, Kenya, the Gambia, Ceylon, Liberia, etc. All right, and other cultures, so it's not just Africa that we have this issue of sending money home, you know, in America, in Latino communities, they call it brown tax. Yeah, and in East Asian cultures, for example, India, Pakistan, um, even China, you know, South Korea, they called they have a system that they call Sala Pahiti. So F I L I A L P I E T Y. So this is like again, a similar to what we do as Africans, you know, the East Asian people send money back home to their to their people to help their families. So let me give you a couple of real life examples before telling you reason why for me, you know, people, Africans, Ghanaians living in the West should not send money back home. So let me give you an example of a couple of Africans who uh earn money and send something back to Africa. So I've got here an example of a Kenyan nurse, yeah. She works in the NHFs and she probably earns about£2,500 a month after tax.

SPEAKER_00: 15:03

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01: 15:04

You may think that's a lot, but in London, that's nothing. But I'll come to that in a minute. Yeah. But she sends between 400 and 600 pounds a month home for school fees and medical care. Another example is a guy named IT worker in Canada, yeah, maybe expected to fund a family project in Accra while paying rent in Toronto. Yeah, so this is just a couple of examples of uh Africans, you know, in the West who are sending money home. Now, let me give you a preamble as to why, you know, for me, this issue about sending money is become a burden and give you reasons why Africans should not send money back to uh back home. So, you know, sending money home is a burden, and the reason why it's a burden is because it can delay wealth building within the man or woman who's sending money back home. Because obviously they can't save or invested anything because they're sending a good chunk of their money, probably up to a quarter of their money back home, yeah, for their family and siblings. This also increases stress on that individual, yeah. So some individuals, some Africans, yeah, are actually taking out loans, believe it or not, they're taking out loans to satisfy the demands of their family and siblings back home. And you and most of you don't even know that. You think they're making it? No, they're not. Some of Africans, and I know some Africans in in London, right? They're taking out loans, yeah, to send money to you back home. And most of you don't appreciate it, yeah. And even in some cases, when some of our people, maybe you know, in Ghana or Nigeria, but put it, let me use Ghana example. You use Ghana example, you know, some African, some Ghanaians living in London, they send money back home to build a house, yeah. Because sorry to say, but most of our Ghanaians are greedy and selfish, right? Most of that money is not spent on the house. That Kwesi or Kwame or Esi or Ama sends back to Ghana. Yeah. A lot of that money does not go on building a house, it goes to a family. So when Ama or Kreisi or Esi comes to Ghana and spent in a house, there's not even a foundation. And I've heard many horrible stories of Ghanaians that send money to Ghana with the help of building a house and not even getting a foundation. To the end that now they refuse to send money back to Ghana. So this is why I say it's a burden, right? Because you know, it creates an entitlement dynamic that wakabuchi said, why are you into why yeah, it's all what we're pushing for. So there's some kind of entitlement that Ghanaians, Africans in the in the West should send money back home, yeah, whether whether they can afford it or not. Yeah, so that's creating the entitlement. Oh, you know, my bushing, you can't breach my cat, and you don't know what they're going through to send you that money. And some of you don't appreciate it, like I said. But so that's a breakdown for me some of the reasons why, yeah, some of the reasons why people should not send money back to Africa, Ghana, or any African country. Right? What many Africans, Ghanaians, don't understand is that in the West, forget, and this is what I said about the perception that the West is a land of milk and it's not. It was, but now it's not. UK, US, Canada, Germany in 2025, it's not like it was in 1995. 30 years ago, life was sweet in Germany, in UK, in US, in Canada. It was sweet, but now, mm-mm. So back home, you've got to understand that all over the Western world, there's a cost of living crisis, and this is deep, beloved. This this is not this is not plaything, this is deep, right? So, for example, rent and mortgages have have tripled, yeah, in London, in Toronto, in New York, since COVID, triple since COVID, yeah. Inflation, yeah, has doubled in some cases in the last four to five years. Yeah, we all know uh how this let's trust. Just three years ago, uh circle minute budget took inflation to a 1.11 percent, yeah. That's now about four percent in UK. But things like food, energy costs, oh my gosh, you know, your heating, your your your your your gas, your lighting, yeah, that's doubled since 2022. Yeah. Transportation costs in landing and in landing alone, landing alone. If you take the underground, don't even take the bus in London, you're paying 13 pounds a day, one free, 13 pounds a day. If you use the underground six days a week, that's 13 times six. That's 78 pounds a week you're spending on transportation in London. That's just that's just the underground. Not I'm not talking about the buses, just the underground. So 78 times four, yeah, you're talking just under 320 pounds a month just on transport. Yeah. Well, let me give you, right? Let me give you the the you know the average housing, average rent in big cities where Africans are living. So in London, the average rent, this is the average rent for maybe a one-bedroom or two-bedroom house in London. You probably look at one bedroom, average rent in London is and and these are and these are all dollars equivalent now. You know, I'm gonna put it in all dollars, yeah. US dollars equivalent so that you know you know where we are. So in London, the average rent is three thousand three hundred dollars a month. So in most cases, that is half the income for many Ghanaians living in London, many Africans living in London, rent alone. In New York, right, that's more than London. So we're talking about between 4,000, average rent in New York is between 4,000 and 5,000 euro dollars a month. Yeah. In uptown Manhattan, it's nearly 6,000 a month, and in the Bronx, which is like the getter, the hood, you're talking about$2,200,$200 a month. Canada, Toronto, average rent in Canada, yeah, is in Toronto, average rent in Toronto, sorry, Toronto, Canada, is between$1,500 and$1,900 a month. This is the US equivalent, yeah, of Canadian dollars. Yeah, so it's not as high as in US or UK, but it's still high in comparative with Canadian rents, yeah. Now we're in Paris, yeah. Most Africans live in one-bedroom apartments in Paris, yeah. Not in two bedrooms, took it one bed, yeah. And the African sharing, you know, that's how bad it is for Africans in Paris, right? There's three Africans sharing a one-bedroom flat in Paris, and the average that they're paying in Paris for a one-bedroom flat, yeah, is between$1,200 and$2,500. Yeah. And in Berlin, which is probably, you know, probably near the cheapest, right? But if it's still high. So in Berlin, you're looking at$1,500 to$2,700. Yeah. And in Berlin, rents have rose in the last few years between 12 and 15%. So this is just rent alone. This is rent, this is the average cost of rent in the many cities of Europe or many cities of the West where Africans are living. Berlin, Paris, Toronto, New York, London has a high concentration of Africans from Ghana, Nigeria, Kenya, what have you. Yeah, and this is the average rent that they're paying out. And that's just rent. Yeah. So I'm not so we haven't even mentioned council tax. Yeah. Or in America or Canada, property rate. We haven't talked about your transport cost. We haven't talked about your gas, utility, gas, water, electricity, heating. Yeah. Then let alone things like food. Yeah. And as I mentioned before, food has now very has now become very expensive in the UK, US, Canada. Yeah. And then you may have, you know, um, you know, gym membership. Gym membership in the UK is averaging about£20 a month.

SPEAKER_00: 25:16

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01: 25:17

In London, it's a bit more than that. London's probably rocking about£25,£30 a month, even more than that, for a Disney gym in London. Yeah. And then, as well as that, you know, somebody, you know, if it's a woman, she may, you know, want to do her hair every week or every other week. You know, if it's a guy, he may cut his hair every two weeks. Or worst case scenario, he may cut his hair once a month because he can't afford it. Yeah, because haircut in London now, outside of London, average cost for haircut is£25. In London, it's probably double that. Just for a haircut. Yeah. The average braid in London, right, is about 200 quid for braid, braiding your hair. Yeah. Outside of London, it's about 100, between 100 and 150 pounds just to braid your hair. Yeah. So what I'm saying is that the the cost of living now in the West is very, very high. Even in London, if you make 10,000, if you make 100,000 pounds a year in London, that's nothing. Because 100,000 pounds a year, that's about roughly um 8,200 pounds a month before taxes.

SPEAKER_00: 26:34

Yeah?

SPEAKER_01: 26:35

And 100,000 pounds a month, right? So 100,000 pounds a year is nearly triple the average wage in UK. Average wage in UK is that's so it's about double, sorry, double. Average wage in UK is about 42,000. And that's London and the southeast, yeah. 42,000. That's the average wage in UK, 42,000. If you go outside of London, you're probably talking about between 35,000, 36, 37,000. Yeah. The cost of living outside of London is not as bad as London, but it's it's still bad. Yeah. So like I say, if you are£100,000 in London, that's nothing. Because like I said, that's before taxes. So that's£8,200 a month before taxes. As a taxes, you probably do about£7,000 a month, or let's say£6,500 a month. Now, depending on where you live in London,£6,500 a month could eat up all your rent and you're pay no bills. If you live in Mayfair, right, central London, you live near um Buckingham Palace, you live in them nine saves of London, you know, Notting Hill, you know, Maydevale, you know, those nine savers of London. You're paying£4,000 rent a month,£3,000 rent a month, but most Africans don't live in them areas. You have the odd few who are very wealthy, but the majority of Africans live in like Yepham, Camberwell, Hapney, Tottenham, Lewisham, yeah. Most Africans live in them kind of south-east London, you know, East London kind of areas, yeah, where the rents are high, still high compared to other parts of the UK, but London terms are pretty low. So, you know, and and and even, you know, one room in London, one room in London, and we're talking South London, like Croydon, um Brixton, Campbell, this is one room, this is a one room house share is about 800 pounds a month. So just imagine if you're living in London, right? You know, and you're living in a one-bedroom flat, that one bedroom flat minimum, at least, you're talking again, depending on where the area, but in South London, Peckham, Lewisham, Campbergwell, the mirrors, right? You're probably talking 82,000 pounds just for one bedroom flat in London, that part of London, South London. Right? So your 8,000 pound, your 6,500 pounds of the taxes, right? Yeah, if you're paying half of that for your rent, because you may want to live in a nice area, not necessarily South London, where, to be frank, it's not too nice. So let's say that£6,500 that you've got£100,000 after taxes, yeah, you're paying half of that for your rent.

SPEAKER_00: 29:42

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01: 29:45

And add to that council tax, which is high in London, add to that transportation, add to that light, gas, heating, add to that water bill, there's a Are your key utilities in in Britain, in England? Light, gas, heating, and water, those are your key utilities. Yeah. Then add to that, you know, you may have gym membership. Add to that, you may have Netflix. Yeah. And that£6,500 after taxes is very, very easy. You have little left. Yeah. For your own personal stuff. If you want to get your hair cut or you want to eat out once a month, you've got very little, let alone have extra to send back home. See, this is what I'm saying to our people back home. It's not easy. UK is not easy. And many Africans in London, let alone the UK, earn less than£100,000 a year. Yeah? So many Africans in UK, if they're in London, they're probably earning between£40,000 and£60,000 a year. Three Africans in London earn more than£70,000,£80,000 a year. But the majority of Africans in London, Ghanaians, Nigerians, Zimbabwe, etc. Right, they're earning between£40,000 a year and£60,000 a year. So after so before taxes, that's between£3,000 a month and£5,000 a month. That's before taxes. After tax. Yeah? So after tax, we're talking about say somebody on£36,000 in London after tax. That's probably about£2,200 a month. That's nothing. That's nothing, London. That's nothing, beloved. That's nothing. That is rent alone. So that's why I say that person may have three jobs in London. If they need£5,000 before taxes in London, yeah, after tax, that£5,000 is probably about£4,000,£4,100. Yeah. Quarter of that will go on rent. You know, out of that£4,100, maybe, you know, uh£1,8,000, 2,000, 2001 will go on rent. Out of that 5,100. So yeah. No, so sorry, 5,000 before after taxes, right? Is about 4,100. So out of that 4,100, at least 18, 19 will go on, we'll go on rent. Yeah. And we haven't talked about cancer tax, light, gas, heating, water, etc. And add to that, some Africans pay tithe to church. So the church. So we have to go to seven-day advantage, juriswitness, Methodist, whatever you write, they'll pay a little tithe each month to the church. Yeah, that could be probably about£100 a month. Yeah. You know, or£80 a month, i.e.,£20 a week. So it's not easy. And like I said, our people in London are literally killing themselves, working three jobs, just to send money back home, just to send even£100 back home, or$200 back home, or 150 euros back home. They're struggling, beloved. They're struggling. And so our people in Ghana, our people in Nigeria, in Kenya, in Zimbabwe, in Tanzania, in other African countries, have got to understand that it's not easy live in Europe. Regardless of what your perception of the West may be, it is not easy living in Europe. And some people are struggling. Many people are struggling. Even white people are struggling in Europe, in UK. There's homelessness in every main city in this country: London, Manchester, Birmingham, Liverpool, Sheffield, Leeds, Nottingham, Derby. Homeless is everywhere. People are struggling in this country. There's food bank in this country. People cannot afford to eat three square meals a day. In actual fact, some adults are starving themselves to feed their children because they can't afford to eat. And you think people can send money home bassa bassa like that? I don't think so, brother. Because the climate now is not like it was 20 to 30 years ago, where the cost of living was not too bad, and the cost of goods and services were pretty reasonable. In actual fact, what Africans again back home in Ghana, Nigeria don't understand is that many Africans have not seen a pay rise. In the back 20s, it's only what last year, when Labour came in in this country, last year, that doctors, nurses, teachers, people working in the public sector have been given a pay rise. And even that pay rise is nowhere near the equivalent of what they were earning 20 years ago. So there's many people in this country, about 90% of people in this country are earning less today than they were 20 years ago, showing you how wages have stagnated.

SPEAKER_00: 35:13

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01: 35:15

And something closing, you know, while you know the concept of sending money back home, it may be it may be a good thing, i.e. to help your mother, your father, i.e. to pay help to pay your sibling school fees, you know, paying medical care bills for elderly relatives, etc. While it is commendable that we have that system, today's climate does not afford the ability to send money home. And the example that I've given you in terms of the high rents now, in many countries where Afghan people live, cost of living is over the roof now. Many Africans are struggling to make ends meet, and particularly if they've got children, some more children, children as well. It's not cheap in the West now for children to raise children, it's expensive. School uniform alone costs a lot in the UK. And more importantly, why when we send money back home, we are, you know, we are giving problems for ourselves because we're not able to save. Many Ghanaians can't save, many Africans can't save. Yeah, we can't have simple investment like buying stocks or shares, yeah, or investment whereby we can see it grow. Like the UK equivalent of a um of a T-bill, or the UK equivalent of a thick deficit. We can't do that because we don't have the money to do that, because we're sending some money back home, yeah. So we become poorer, yeah. We're not able to save for build our house in Ghana or African country because of this extra burden of sending money back home, in addition to you know the high cost of living, high rents that we are experiencing in the West. And so for me, the time has come, unfortunately, for it's up to the individual, but for me, the time has come for many Ghanaians, many Africans living in the West, whether you're in the UK, US, Canada, Germany, to stop sending money home because it is not sustainable, yeah. And you're making, you know, a lot of Africans are making themselves sick, yeah, just to send money home. And it's not appreciated. A lot of it's stunning as well, particularly when it comes to building a property for that person who's in Ghana, who's in London or UK or US, yeah. It's also denying us, you know, uh a chance to build intergenerational wealth by handing down money to our children and their children. Yeah. And it's also putting an enormous burden and strain on Africans living in the UK. So there's a lot of Africans now have got stress because of this thing to get money to send back home to your family. Yeah, it's it's become a burden now. And you know, some sometimes don't understand why, you know, Kofi or AMA or Akusia has only sending 200 pounds a month when they're spending double that. Yeah, so you have to appreciate that the cost of living in the West has changed, particularly since COVID. And so I thank you for listening to this special edition of Ghanaian Focus, uh, the first in our series of UK Black, looking at certain issues that are affecting Ghanaians and other Africans living in the UK. And this week's edition, we started with a controversial topic looking at why Africans, Ghanaians living in the West should not send money back home. And I've given you my reasons why for that, you may disagree, but I live in the West, I live in the UK, and we know what's going on in the UK in terms of the money that people are getting compared to what it was, and also the rents that people are paying now, and the general cost of living in the UK is different to what it was 20 or 25 years ago. So I thank you for listening to this edition of uh UK Black, Ghana and Focus, with myself Kwame, Ghanaian writer, broadcaster, journalist, podcast, and entrepreneur. In next week's edition of Ghana and Focus, we'll be talking about the high housing crisis in Ghana. Yes, there's a massive housing crisis in Ghana right now, and if nothing's done about it, you know, uh the main cities in Ghana, like Tema, Accra, Kumasi, are going to be basically unlivable. Yeah, because the infrastructure is not there to support masses and masses of people that are moving from the rural areas to the urban areas. So look out for that next week in Ghana in Focus, looking and examining and analyzing housing crisis in Ghana. So for now, for myself Kwame, and from all the crew here listening on Ghana in Focus, thank you very much for your time. And we'll see you next week for some more Ghana in Focus. Hope you've enjoyed this first edition of UK Black. Let us have your comments and uh please comment in the comment section if you are on Spotify on YouTube, and also drop me an email if you'd like to know about doing business in Ghana. So until next week, thank you for listening, and we'll see you next week.