Possible misconceptions about Affirmative Action

[willbell]

In a perfect world, if Affirmative Action were necessary I would consider the best policy to be selecting out of the applicants who get to the short list and presumably with equal or nearly identical qualifications a proportion equal to the percent of applicants of that race that make it to the short list certainly this would be more practical than choosing it randomly or something like that. Anything above that aiming for preferential hiring is unnecessary, but in a field dominated by a single race where prejudice towards that race could exist it might be necessary to take those small steps towards equality.

 

[russ_watters]

Will you go a step further and agree that there are?

No. I haven't thought through the other side enough to have thought of any on my own.

but not firearms

The Second Amendment is so poorly written and out of its time I have trouble reconciling it logically at all. At face value though, you would seem to be correct.

 

[russ_watters]

...but in a field dominated by a single race where prejudice towards that race could exist it might be necessary to take those small steps towards equality.

The "whiteness" of NFL coaches is in the news again (as a bad thing that needs to be fixed), while the under-representation of whites in the NBA is being lauded...of course the NBA doesn't spin it that way though.

Fourteen NBA head coaches are black, tying the 30-team league's own record for the most ever in a sport.

With Canales and Miami coach Erik Spoelstra, a Filipino-American, the NBA has 16 coaches of color, its most ever, according to Richard Lapchick, the director of the institute for diversity and ethics in sport and the primary author of the Racial and Gender Report Card that gives the NBA higher grades than any other sport.
The league earned an A last year -- with an A+ in the race category -- largely for the high number of league executive positions held by minorities.

http://www.nba.com/2012/news/04/26/minority-coaches-NBA.ap/index.html

With 14 whites out of 30 coaches, that's 46%. With 72% of the population being white, they are under-represented by a whopping 7 coaches. Shouldn't that be cause for concern, leading to an Affirmative Action program to attract white coaches?

Recently, regarding the NFL:

During the 2011 season, there were 11 minority head coaches (including interim job-holders), but the 2013 season will start with just four.

http://espn.go.com/nfl/story/_/id/8869547/time-update-rooney-rule

The NFL has 32 teams, so 4 is under-representing minorities by 5...though 2011's 11 was over representing them. But this is apparently cause for great concern.

Double. Standard.

 

[mheslep]

... You continue the policies because things are moving in the right direction, but you haven't gotten there yet.

Taking http://www.census.gov/hhes/www/income/data/historical/household/2011/H03W_2011.xls and http://www.census.gov/hhes/www/income/data/historical/household/2011/H03B_2011.xls incomes from 1967 to 2011, tossing them into a spreadsheet, and comparing black incomes as a percentage of white incomes, you have mixed results.

...

Those income differences vanish when corrected for educational attainment, marital status, age and the like, at least they did a few decades ago.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v_pQ7KXv0o0

 

[Einstein Mcfly]

It increases the pool by using outreach and recruitment programs in underrepresented areas, just one example. I never claimed it did anything regarding the qualifications of the applicants, nor did I claim people don't make their own decisions about applying for jobs/college. Giving a group access to positions that were previously inaccessible does not force them to apply for them. It also does not force anyone to select them for such positions. Quotas are gone.

I guess I'll link this again:

http://www.dol.gov/ofccp/regs/compliance/fs11246.htm#.UO9V-G8708g

Outreach, recruitment, and training efforts increase the pool size by reaching out to underrepresented groups. Opportunity provisions are separate from the selection process. I've yet to find anything in the executive order or the AA requirements that specify selection procedures which are to be followed. The selection process is to be conducted without discrimination. Efforts to increase the pool from which candidates are selected are what's addressed by AA.



They both were included in the pool. If discrimination were present, one would be unjustly excluded from the pool. For example, assume you're a company looking to fill a janitorial position. It's possible to exclude an entire segment of the population from even being able to be in the pool of applicants if you only provide applications in English. Since a janitorial position probably does not require someone to be completely fluent in English, you could increase the pool of applicants by providing applications in other languages. By providing applications in other languages, you do not exclude anyone.



I'm requesting a bit of latitude here, since it would be difficult to present an entire AA program with a key quote. Here are the contents of the pages with corrective actions for problem areas shown by the company's data analysis. I do not see any discrimination present in the corrective actions.

From page 16:


From page 17:




A goal is not a quota. What you saw in the AAP were goals. Quotas are rigid and exclusionary; they imply, "This is what you must achieve, no matter what." Goals are flexible and inclusive; they imply, "This is what we think you can achieve if you try your best." Goals are simply program objectives translated into numbers. They provide a target to strive for and a vehicle for measuring progress.
http://hrweb.berkeley.edu/faq/1660



Then how are you defining "often" without numbers? If you don't like court cases, is there a study to support your position? Something that would lead you to believe that reverse discrimination due to AA occurs "often"? Also, to include cases that happened decades ago is hardly fair, since we're talking about AA's current requirements, which have changed.


I already did, in my first post of the thread.


Fair enough.


Hyperbole is unnecessary. The analogy served to point out the danger in the line of reasoning, not make any claims about the validity of either concept. It does not always follow that poor implementations are due to flawed concepts.

I may have missed it, but have you addressed the notion of providing extra "points" in an applicant's favor because of their race? You seem to be sticking to this idea that all AA is nowadays is "outreach and training" and "broadening the applicant pool" and not the elements that related directly to outcomes based on race.

 

[Tosh5457]

Here is an example of an AAP that meets the Dept. of Labor's standards. Pages 15 through 19 show problem areas and their possible solutions. I was not able to find any unjust or prejudicial treatment in the solutions proposed.

http://www.dol.gov/ofccp/regs/compli.../sampleaap.pdf

Those solutions are discriminatory, although in a subtle way:

• No later than March 1, 2010, notify management and
professional recruitment sources, in writing, of FCI’s
interest in attracting qualified minorities and women to
apply for job openings.
• No later than March 1, 2010, expand FCI’s recruitment
program to colleges and universities with a significant
percentage of minority and female students.

To attract qualified minorities and women for job openings means that people that aren't in that category won't get nearly as exposed to those opportunities.

And look at what the company has to present for the audit:

The following documents are maintained as a component of FCI’s internal audit
process:
1. An applicant flow log showing the name, race, sex, date of application, job title,
interview status and the action taken for all individuals applying for job
opportunities;
2. Summary data of external job offers and hires, promotions, resignations,
terminations, and layoffs by job group and by sex and minority group
identification;
3. Summary data of applicant flow by identifying, at least, total applicants, total
minority applicants, and total female applicants for each position;

Guess what will happen if they only hire a few individuals classified as minorities? I'm sure the auditors won't like it. There is a huge incentive to discriminate in AA laws. AA requires that you benefit people, directly or indirectly, because of their status as a minority, and in a competitive environment that's exactly the same as discriminating people who are not classified as such.

And then there's the double standard as Russ pointed out, show me one AA case that includes white males in it. Jews are over-represented in many sectors. Where's the AA norm to "correct" that? I'm sure that many of AA supporters would oppose something to correct that.

 

[Jack21222]

The "whiteness" of NFL coaches is in the news again (as a bad thing that needs to be fixed), while the under-representation of whites in the NBA is being lauded...of course the NBA doesn't spin it that way though.

http://www.nba.com/2012/news/04/26/minority-coaches-NBA.ap/index.html

With 14 whites out of 30 coaches, that's 46%. With 72% of the population being white, they are under-represented by a whopping 7 coaches. Shouldn't that be cause for concern, leading to an Affirmative Action program to attract white coaches?

Recently, regarding the NFL: http://espn.go.com/nfl/story/_/id/8869547/time-update-rooney-rule

The NFL has 32 teams, so 4 is under-representing minorities by 5...though 2011's 11 was over representing them. But this is apparently cause for great concern.

Double. Standard.

Why are you using the general population here? Shouldn't you be using the set of all basketball players as your population? I guarantee you that not 72% of basketball players are white, so why would you use that number?

 

[Tosh5457]

Actually, you abandon the policies because they've improved things to the point you're satisfied (mission complete) or because they've provided no improvement at all (mission failure). You continue the policies because things are moving in the right direction, but you haven't gotten there yet.

Taking http://www.census.gov/hhes/www/income/data/historical/household/2011/H03W_2011.xls and http://www.census.gov/hhes/www/income/data/historical/household/2011/H03B_2011.xls incomes from 1967 to 2011, tossing them into a spreadsheet, and comparing black incomes as a percentage of white incomes, you have mixed results.

The top 20% of black incomes are between 65% and 70% of the top 20% of white incomes and stayed flat for 45 years.

The middle 5th of black incomes started out less than 60% of the middle 5th of white incomes, has reached as high as 67% of the middle 5th by the early 2000's, but has settled back down to around 62% of white incomes. In other words, there's been some improvement, but not great. In fact, it's gotten worse over the last decade.

The 2nd lowest 5th went from less than 55% of the 2nd lowest white incomes to almost 65% of the 2nd lowest white incomes by the early 2000's, but has fallen back to barely over 55%. In other words, there was some significant improvement among a group that needed it a lot, but that improvement has virtually disappeared during the last decade.

The lowest 5th of black incomes went from just under 60% of the lowest white incomes and has fallen to less than 50% of the lowest white incomes. Whatever we've been doing to reduce racial disparity in incomes has been a failure when it comes to the most poor (and especially over the last decade).

East Asians have proportionally more people in math related courses than whites, where's the AA program to correct that? Blacks have proportionally more running athletes than other ethnicities, where's the program to correct that? If we're going to pretend ethnicity doesn't play a role in anything there's a lot to correct...

 

[Dembadon]

I may have missed it, but have you addressed the notion of providing extra "points" in an applicant's favor because of their race? You seem to be sticking to this idea that all AA is nowadays is "outreach and training" and "broadening the applicant pool" and not the elements that related directly to outcomes based on race.

How common is that? A point system is discrimination during the selection process, something which is explicitly stated as unsatisfactory on the DoL's website.

Those solutions are discriminatory, although in a subtle way:

To attract qualified minorities and women for job openings means that people that aren't in that category won't get nearly as exposed to those opportunities.

"People who aren't in that category" are already being exposed to the opportunities.

Look, most of the people who've responded in this thread have taken the position that if an implementation is flawed, then the concept is flawed. We'll have to agree to disagree about that; It's dangerous reasoning that I'm not willing to make for obvious reasons. As BobG mentioned, AA is not ideal, but it's the best thing we've got, and it has yet to be shown that it does a significant disservice to white males. A handful of court cases shows a rare issue at best when considering how many cases the EEOC handles each year.

Is AA perfect? No. How about some better ideas? I've yet to hear anyone provide an alternative. If you want to throw the baby out with the bathwater, let's hear a better plan for preventing discrimination.

 

[russ_watters]

Why are you using the general population here? Shouldn't you be using the set of all basketball players as your population? I guarantee you that not 72% of basketball players are white, so why would you use that number?

That only makes sense if you assume all coaches are former pro players and that the demographics hasn't changed as they age...and that all of that is relevant. If we go there, then we have to start asking why whites are under-represented in pro basketball as players and what can be done to fix that!

 

[Dembadon]

East Asians have proportionally more people in math related courses than whites, where's the AA program to correct that?

You are misunderstanding the purpose of an AAP. An AAP for a college would expand the pool of candidates for selection. What people do after they've been selected is their own business. At no point in the description of AA does it state a desire for equal representation in what people choose for their major.

Blacks have proportionally more running athletes than other ethnicities, where's the program to correct that? If we're going to pretend ethnicity doesn't play a role in anything there's a lot to correct...

Why do you think that is? If you feel it's due to lack of recruitment, outreach, or training, then it should be addressed by AA. If not, then it's irrelevant because you can't force someone into a given hobby/profession, nor is that the goal.

 

[Dembadon]

That only makes sense if you assume all coaches are former pro players and that the demographics hasn't changed as they age...and that all of that is relevant. If we go there, then we have to start asking why whites are under-represented in pro basketball as players and what can be done to fix that!

Just because the goal is equal outcome does not mean that will always happen, nor is it a bad thing. If good faith efforts are being made to recruit white players, then the requirements of AA are satisfied.

 

[Evo]

Jews are over-represented in many sectors. Where's the AA norm to "correct" that? I'm sure that many of AA supporters would oppose something to correct that.

What do you mean "Jews are over-represented in many sectors"? Jew(ish) is not a race. Like Christian is not a race. And please provide the valid source that backs up your statement.

 

[Einstein Mcfly]

How common is that? A point system is discrimination during the selection process, something which is explicitly stated as unsatisfactory on the DoL's website.

This thread is growing tiresome, as you seem to be seizing on one specific and uncontroversial instance of one organization's phrasing of "affirmative action" and ignoring (either through ignorance or convenience) the many controversial instances of affirmative action. I don't see how anyone taking part in an honest argument about this can claim that they don't know about extra points for race in college admissions. This the entire point of the current case before the supreme court.

Is AA perfect? No. How about some better ideas? I've yet to hear anyone provide an alternative. If you want to throw the baby out with the bathwater, let's hear a better plan for preventing discrimination.

There is no fair solution that only addresses this at the back end (hiring, admissions etc). The only way to get an underrepresented group to be more successful is to address the issue at the front end by making them equally qualified. This means that whatever their group/culture is missing compared to successful groups must be addressed. Minority groups that don't have the need for AA such as east and south asians have cultures with prize studying and scholastic achievement, parental involvement and value higher education. The first step is for all to have equal opportunity (access to decent education), but to enforce equal outcomes among individuals that aren't equally qualified will always be unfair.

 

[Curious3141]

There is no fair solution that only addresses this at the back end (hiring, admissions etc). The only way to get an underrepresented group to be more successful is to address the issue at the front end by making them equally qualified. This means that whatever their group/culture is missing compared to successful groups must be addressed. Minority groups that don't have the need for AA such as east and south asians have cultures with prize studying and scholastic achievement, parental involvement and value higher education. The first step is for all to have equal opportunity (access to decent education), but to enforce equal outcomes among individuals that aren't equally qualified will always be unfair.

It's not quite so simple. There's been a reasonably well-conducted Canadian study that proved that job applicants with non-white sounding names had far fewer responses than those with white names.

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/repo...g-name-may-affect-the-job-hunt/article555082/

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/story/2009/05/20/bc-ubc-job-study.html

The discrimination is so entrenched that many applicants are not getting a fair shake simply because their names don't sound "white" enough. They never even get a chance to attend an interview, discuss their qualifications and experience, and convince the would-be employers that their language skills are up to scratch. Instead, they're being excluded because of the names they were given at birth.

This form of discrimination is very difficult to eradicate. Assuring equal access to education, etc. will not solve the problem entirely. A racial quota-based system is far from perfect, but at least it'll "force" employers to hire a fair proportion of qualified minorities and somewhat offset this sort of discrimination.

 

[Einstein Mcfly]

It's not quite so simple. There's been a reasonably well-conducted Canadian study that proved that job applicants with non-white sounding names had far fewer responses than those with white names.

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/repo...g-name-may-affect-the-job-hunt/article555082/

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/story/2009/05/20/bc-ubc-job-study.html

The discrimination is so entrenched that many applicants are not getting a fair shake simply because their names don't sound "white" enough. They never even get a chance to attend an interview, discuss their qualifications and experience, and convince the would-be employers that their language skills are up to scratch. Instead, they're being excluded because of the names they were given at birth.

This form of discrimination is very difficult to eradicate. Assuring equal access to education, etc. will not solve the problem entirely. A racial quota-based system is far from perfect, but at least it'll "force" employers to hire a fair proportion of qualified minorities and somewhat offset this sort of discrimination.

Indeed, this is very difficult to eradicate immediately. I would argue that the only way that this issue can be solved is to make all groups equally qualified and, after a period of time (which would likely be many years) this would disappear just as issues with peoples' makes being too Irish sounding disappeared. In the short term, the best solution would be to remove race from official documents as well as remove names on applications and such and go by initials or some such thing. I'd also do the same with sex on official documents. By including categories other than the truly relevant ones related to the qualifications of the applicant, we're actually increasing the probability that the discrimination you're talking about will occur.

 

[Dembadon]

This thread is growing tiresome, as you seem to be seizing on one specific and uncontroversial instance of one organization's phrasing of "affirmative action" and ignoring (either through ignorance or convenience) the many controversial instances of affirmative action. I don't see how anyone taking part in an honest argument about this can claim that they don't know about extra points for race in college admissions. This the entire point of the current case before the supreme court.

I didn't claim to be unaware of the point system; I asked how common it was.

If you wanted an honest argument, the least you could've done is avoided calling me ignorant for providing information I was specifically asked to provide. Did you read the posts in the thread before writing your response, or did you just skim them? My "one specific" example was given in response to a request to provide an example of an approved AA program that doesn't discriminate.

Somewhere I must've given the impression that I'm unwilling to change my views about AA. This is not the case; I'm open to learning more about it's faults and appreciate those who've provided evidence about its potential dangers when implemented incorrectly. Evo and Russ have provided cases showing cause for legitimate concern about how AA is implemented, but I don't believe a handful of cases is very convincing when one considers how many discrimination complaints are handled by the EEOC each year. If you believe issues due to AA are rampant, then show me. If the issues are not rampant, then do we really need to scrap it? If a few cases pop up here and there, that's what our justice system is for.

 

[Skrew]

What do you mean "Jews are over-represented in many sectors"? Jew(ish) is not a race. Like Christian is not a race. And please provide the valid source that backs up your statement.

Not quite, Ashkenazi jews can be considered a genetically distinct group, at least according to wiki.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ashkenazi_Jews

Their evolution was looked at in a book I read called "The 10,000 year explosion".

https://www.amazon.com/dp/0465020429/?tag=pfamazon01-20

Their IQ(which is also looked at here:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ashkenazi_Jewish_intelligence) according to the book is at the top end of all groups tested so it would be no surprise if they dominated Ivy League universities or other intellectual areas, which I think Tosh was referring to(I actually believe I read they do in fact, but I can't find the source off hand).

 

[Evo]

Not quite, Ashkenazi jews can be considered a genetically distinct group, at least according to wiki.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ashkenazi_Jews

Their evolution was looked at in a book I read called "The 10,000 year explosion".

https://www.amazon.com/dp/0465020429/?tag=pfamazon01-20

Their IQ(which is also looked at here:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ashkenazi_Jewish_intelligence) according to the book is at the top end of all groups tested so it would be no surprise if they dominated Ivy League universities or other intellectual areas, which I think Tosh was referring to(I actually believe I read they do in fact, but I can't find the source off hand).

They're not a different race. Let's stick to facts. And Tosh's rant was off topic to the thread.

 

[Einstein Mcfly]

They're not a different race. Let's stick to facts. And Tosh's rant was off topic to the thread.

This is very much on point as I see it, as however you decided to explain the grouping, they definitely have a distinct culture that prizes academic achievement, family stability etc and this, not race, seems to me to be the key to their (or any other groups') success.

 

[Evo]

This is very much on point as I see it, as however you decided to explain the grouping, they definitely have a distinct culture that prizes academic achievement, family stability etc and this, not race, seems to me to be the key to their (or any other groups') success.

Which is completely off topic for this thread. This is about Affirmative Action. Not about how cultures regard academic achievement.

This thread is done as it seems to have gone permanently off topic.