Friday, April 17, 1998
Ending affirmative action will bring society widespread negative
effects
Opportunities necessary for minorities to achieve social
mobility
By Ramin Farahmandpur
Until equal educational opportunities are attained by minorities
and women, affirmative action must continue to be enforced. Ending
affirmative action requires changes in the existing social,
economic and cultural structures of the United States, which is
currently riddled with racist, sexist and homophobic ideology.
As Hugh B. Price (National Voter "Affirmative action: why
inclusion matters to America," March/April) explains: "Politicians
who are unwilling to address the economic vulnerability of ordinary
Americans seem determined to distract them from their insecurities
by pitting financially put-upon white males against equally
put-upon women and minorities." Affirmative action was devised to
ensure that all Americans – especially minorities, women and other
marginalized groups – have the same equal opportunities as everyone
else.
Further, affirmative action was created not only to amend past
discrimination but to ensure the protection of equal civil rights
of minorities and women in the future. Given the poor record of the
history of civil rights in the United States, it is reasonable to
argue that the elimination of affirmative action programs will
result in the violation of the rights of minorities and women under
the Fourteenth Amendment.
However, as conservatives and Republicans point out, the growth
minorities in the middle-class during the past several decades is
proof of the existence of social mobility and equal opportunities.
Yet, as Jarvis Tyner (Political Affairs, "Current tasks in the
struggle for equality," December 1997) reminds us, "Though there
has been a growth in the Black middle-class stratum over the last
20 years, this has been accomplished by an increase in poverty
among African Americans as a whole. Over 95 percent of our people
are working class. And most live in the cities."
Ending affirmative action will seriously jeopardize the
educational opportunities of minorities as well. Nancy Folber, in
her 1995 book "The New Field Guide to the U. S. Economy," states
that, although the percentage of African Americans and Latinos who
have graduated from high school has increased (in 1993), less than
71 percent of those over the age of 25 had completed four or more
years of high school and less than 13 percent had completed four or
more years of college.
Moreover, with the elimination of affirmative action, women as a
social class – particularly women of color – will experience
increasing social and economic hardship. Folber continues: "The
proportion of families maintained by women alone has increased
among all ethnic groups but it is especially high among people of
color. In 1993, 47 percent of African American families and 23
percent of all Latino families fell into this category."
Before we can even begin to think about dismantling affirmative
action, the following goals must be achieved:
First, we must increase the number of minorities admitted to
institutions of higher education, especially academic programs such
as law and medicine, where they have been historically
under-represented. An increase in the admission of minorities into
these programs will not have a significant impact on the admission
of whites. As Victor Perlo (Political Affairs, "Affirmative action
and the struggle for equality," February 1995) says, "an increase
in Black admission to law school from 5 percent to 15 percent –
using hypothetical figures – represents an increase of 200 percent,
while the corresponding reduction in admission of whites, from 95
to 85 percent of the total, represents a small decline of about 10
percent."
In addition, affirmative action is not considered "reverse
discrimination" as many conservatives and Republicans have charged.
What it does mean is that more qualified minorities and people of
color who have been denied admission to institutions of higher
education because of racism and discrimination in the past will now
have the same opportunities as everyone else.
Second, women have historically earned lower wages than men for
performing the same work, which many have described as
"feminization of poverty." Folber notes that although women’s
economic status has improved during the past 12 years, women only
earn 71 cents for every dollar men earn.
Today, more families are maintained by women than ever before.
In 1993, for example, more than 88 percent of children living in
single- parent homes were homes run by women. Programs such as
child care, prenatal care and equal pay for comparable jobs are
important goals that need to be accomplished before affirmative
action can be terminated. Also, women should be provided equal
opportunities in occupations such as engineering, law and medicine.
While in 1960, 1 percent of all engineers were women, that figure
increased to 9 percent in 1993. Although this does show a
significant increase, we believe there is room for improvement.
Moreover, African American and Latinos continue to be
under-represented in professional and managerial occupations.
Instead, they have been confined to low paying jobs that whites
have avoided. "About a quarter of all African-Americans and a fifth
of all Latinos work at the low end of the occupational ladder, in
poorly paid service jobs" (1995).
This has led to minorities earning lower wages than whites.
Consequently, there should be an increase in the number of
minorities hired both in the public and private sector.
In sum, ending affirmative action requires ending social,
political and economic inequalities and reflecting a genuine,
heterogeneous and democratic American society.