Affirmative Action

Impact of Affirmative Action on Me
Affirmative Action actually hurts my chances in getting into a college. Affirmative Action gives preference to African Americans and Hispanics over whites and Asian. Asians may be a minority, but they tend to have higher scores than most Americans.

The same goes for getting a job. If I want to get employed at a company that considers affirmative action, it lowers my chance at getting the job.

However, this preference usually  only apply if I tie with an African American/ Hispanic for a position. If I happen to be way better qualified, the college/employer would have to choose me. But, if I'm tied or am just a little more qualified, they can choose someone else over me.

But, if you look at it genderwise, Affirmative action will probably benefit me because I'm a girl.

So, I'm probably better off than a white male and worse off than a hispanic women.
Date: 11-7-11
More on the Debate
Locally.... Sally Kern on Women

National Debate on Affirmative Action

Locally...Sally Kern on Minorities: African Americans

Nationally... Thomas Sowell!

Democrats and Republicans on Affirmative Action
  • Generally, democrats  tend to support it, while republicans tend to oppose it. 
  • However, not all democrats/republicans support their partys' views on the issue. Some democrats are against it while some republicans think it's a good idea.
  • Many Americans support the idea of affirmative action but are against the way it is implemented. For example, some say that instead of looking at race as an indicator, income level, medical disadvantages etc. should be directly considered.
  • Obama's views:



Sources:
Interest Groups and Affirmative Action
ACLU (American Civil Liberties Union) :
  • Stance: Supports it.
  • Affirmative Action is one of the most effective tools for redressing the injustices caused by our nation’s historic discrimination against people of color and women, and for leveling what has long been an uneven playing field. A centuries-long legacy of racism and sexism has not been eradicated despite the gains made during the civil rights era. Avenues of opportunity for those previously excluded remain far too narrow. We need affirmative action now more than ever.
LULAC (League of United Latin American Citizens):
  • Stance: Supports it.
  • We have been slow in defining affirmative action and have failed to get the public response generated by the opposition. Affirmative action merely casts a wider net to include a larger number of qualified applicants to compete and participate. Affirmative action allows women and people of color and other minorities access to higher education, jobs, and business opportunities which have been historically out of their reach. Affirmative action is a system of goals and programs that strengthens our national economy. It provides Corporate America with the diversity necessary to compete in the global market. It helps to ensure that the public sector is reflective of the populations it serves. Quotas and preferential treatment have never been a part of any affirmative action program.
CAIR (Council of American Muslim Relations)
  • Stance: Supports it.
  • The mistake of many critics of affirmative action is to understand it only as a guilt-driven form of reparations. By that thinking, white people are discriminated against today solely to make up for generations of bias against minorities. But greater diversity in any setting almost always benefits the nation as a whole. A diverse police force has tentacles in every corner of a community. A diverse classroom is likely to engage in a more robust and educational discussion of, say, The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. A diverse Supreme Court can better appreciate the social impact of its decisions.
NAACP (National Association for the Advancement of Colored People)
  • Stance: Supports it.
  • The necessity of Affirmative Action has been a hot topic in American society for a number of years. Affirmative Action was established in 1965 by President Johnson in order to redress the discrimination that was evident in employment, education and business despite the civil rights laws which made such discrimination illegal. The purpose of Affirmative Action is to provide opportunities for minorities and women; it is not meant to create quotas.
 NOW (National Organization of Women)
  • Stance: Supports it.
  • Affirmative Action levels the playing field so people of color and all women have the chance to compete in education and in business. White men hold 95% to 97% of the high-level corporate jobs. And that's with affirmative action programs in place. Imagine how low figures would be without affirmative action. Of 3000 federal court decisions in discrimination cases between 1990 and 1994, only 100 involved claims of reverse discrimination; only 6 of those claims were found to be valid...Despite the enormous gains made by the civil rights and women's rights movements, women and people of color still face unfair obstacles in business and education. An astonishing 70% of schools are not in compliance with Title IX, the federal equal education opportunity law. For every dollar earned by men, women on a whole earn 74 cents, African American women earn 63 cents and Latina women earn 57 cents. According to the Census Bureau, only 25% of all doctors and lawyers are women. Less than 1% of auto mechanics are women. And women are only 8.4% of engineers.

Sources:
http://www.aclu.org/FilesPDFs/affirmative_action99.pdf
http://lulac.org/advocacy/issues/speech/
http://www.cairchicago.org/tag/affirmative-action/
http://www.naacp.org/blog/entry/the-debate-on-affirmative-action
http://www.now.org/issues/affirm/talking.html
Date: 10-29/30-11
Affirmative Action Personally Affects...


Breaking Down The Data




Sources:
 http://pewresearchcenter.org/
Date: 10-29-11

Where House Representatives and Senators Stand
Oklahoma House Votes
Yeas:85
Armes              Fourkiller         McNiel             Roberts, D.       
Banz               Glenn              McPeak             Roberts, S.       
Bennett            Grau               Moore              Rousselot         
Billy              Hall               Morgan             Russ              
Blackwell          Hardin             Mulready           Sanders           
Brumbaugh          Hickman            Murphey            Schwartz          
Cannaday           Holland            Nelson             Sears             
Casey              Hoskin             Newell             Shannon           
Christian          Inman              Nollan             Stiles            
Cockroft           Jackson            Ortega             Sullivan          
Condit             Jordan             Osborn             Terrill           
Coody              Joyner             Ownbey             Thomsen           
Cooksey            Kern               Peters             Tibbs             
Cox                Key                Peterson           Trebilcock        
Dank               Kirby              Pittman            Vaughan           
Denney             Kouplen            Proctor            Watson            
Derby              Liebmann           Pruett             Wesselhoft        
DeWitt             Lockhart           Quinn              Wright            
Dorman             Martin, Sc.        Renegar            Mr.Speaker        
Enns               Martin, St.        Reynolds          
Farley             McCullough         Richardson        
Faught             McDaniel, R.       Ritze             

NAYS:7
Hamilton           Scott              Shumate            Williams          
McDaniel, J.       Shelton            Virgin            

EXCUSED:9
Brown              McAffrey           Sherrer           
Hilliard           Morrissette        Shoemake          
Johnson            Roan               Walker

Oklahoma Senate Votes

YEAS:37
Aldridge          Burrage           Jolley            Shortey          
Allen             Crain             Justice           Simpson           Anderson          David             Marlatt           Sparks           
Ballenger         Ellis             Mazzei            Stanislawski     
Barrington        Fields            Myers             Sykes            
Bingman           Ford              Newberry          Treat            
Branan            Garrison          Nichols           Wyrick           
Brecheen          Halligan          Reynolds         
Brinkley          Holt              Russell          
Brown             Johnson, R.       Schulz            

NAYS:8
Bass              Eason Mc          Laster            Rice             
Coates            Johnson, C.       Lerblance         Wilson           

EXCUSED: 3
Adelson           Ivester           Paddack          

Sources:
http://www.oklegislature.gov/BillInfo.aspx?Bill=HB1446
Date: 10-31-11
Statistics on Affirmative Action
Some interesting statistics and pieces of information on the issue:
Support/opposition
Over three-fourths of whites oppose Affirmative Action, white over 80% of Blacks support it and deem it necessary.
77 % of whites and 64 % of Hispanics oppose the Affirmative Action because they think it dictates racial quotas, 80 % whites and 71 % Hispanics are against the special preference given by Affirmative Action, 84 % blacks think that Affirmative Action is still necessary; (usembassy.de)
Facts and Figures on Female/ Black/ Latino Discrimination
Year 1993: Blacks and Latinos 1/2 as likely as whites to be managers/professionals.
                     Both very likely to be hired for low paying jobs.
Year 1998: Women earned 73% of men for the same occupation!
Year 2000: Latinos earned $395.
                    African Americans earned $459.
                    Whites earned 590.
In 2000, the median weekly earning for blacks was $459; for Latinos, it was $395. In that period, average income for whites was $590... In 1993, black and Latino men were half as likely as whites to be employed as managers or professionals and much more likely to be employed as machine operators and laborers. Barriers to equality also remain for women...In 1998, women earned only 73% of the wages earned by men, according to the Census Bureau. This pay gap exists even within the same occupation. Indeed, the average woman loses approximately $523,000 in wages over a lifetime due to pay disparities...The National Urban Institute proved this theory recently, when it sent equally qualified pairs of job applicants on a series of interviews for entry-level jobs. The young men were coached to display similar levels of enthusiasm and “articulateness.” The young white men received 45% more job offers than their African American co-testers; whites were offered the job 52% more often than Latino “applicants.” (aclu.org)
As affirmative action opened doors of opportunity for women and minorities, education level trends showed positive results.
  • African American master degree holders increased 285% from 1990-2006.
  • Hispanic doctorate degree holders increased 141% in the same 16 year period.
  • Asian/ Pacific Islander associate degree holders also increased dramatically-169%.
Number of Bachelor Degree Holders
                                                    1990            1995        2000       2005         2006 
(Blue is African Americans, Red is Hispanic, Green is Asian/Pacific Islander, Purple is American Indian/Alaska Native)
(usembassy.de)

Sources
http://usa.usembassy.de/classroom/affirmativeaction.htm 
http://www.aclu.org/FilesPDFs/affirmative_action99.pdf
Date:10-25-11
-Who Benefits from Affirmative Action? Who Doesn't?
Affirmative action is aimed at promoting women and minorities-namely African Americans, Hispanics, and Asian Americans-in universities and work places. Below are some statistics on progress of women and minorities. There is a direct relationship between their advancement and the implementation of affirmative action. John F. Kennedy first introduced this term in his Executive Order 10925 in 1961. After this year, different bills and acts were passed to broaden opportunities for women and minorities. The Civil Rights Act of 1964, the Executive Order 11246 (1965), the Veterans Readjustment Act of 1974 and so on are some examples.
Affirmative action has helped the income, promotion and labor force participation rates of both women and minorities. For example, between 1982 and 1995, the percentage of female managers and professionals in the U.S. rose from 40.5 to 48.0 percent; blacks from 5.5 to 7.5 percent, and Hispanics from 5.2 to 7.6 percent. By comparison, these groups form 51.2 percent, 12.6 percent, and 10.2 percent of the population, respectively. Progress has been steady, but still incomplete. (huppie.com)
 The success of affirmative action can be seen in the following chart. The highest paying jobs in the U.S. are managerial and professional, and the percentage of women and minorities being hired in these jobs has been rising:
Year     Female   Black   Hispanic*
----------------------------------
1982     40.5%     5.5%     5.2%
1983     40.9      5.6      5.2
1984     41.6      5.7      5.5
1985     42.7      5.9      5.7
1986     43.4      6.0      6.0
1987     44.3      6.2      6.3
1988     44.7      6.1      6.4
1989     45.2      6.1      6.3
1990     45.8      6.4      6.8
1991     46.3      6.4      7.0
1992     47.3      6.6      7.3
1993     47.8      6.8      7.7
1994     48.1      7.1      7.7
1995     48.0      7.5      7.6
*Includes Spanish, Cuban, Puerto Rican and Mexican Americans
(huppie.com)
 
By comparison, women comprised 51.2 percent of the 1995 U.S. population; blacks comprised 12.6 percent, and Hispanics, 10.2 percent.(huppie.com)
Sources:
http://affirmativeaction.ucr.edu/history.html
http://www.huppi.com/kangaroo/L-aahelp.htm
http://www.csus.edu/indiv/g/gaskilld/business_computer_ethics/the%20case%20against%20affirmative%20action.htm
http://theblacksentinel.wordpress.com/2008/04/18/affirmative-action-hurts-people/
http://quickfacts.census.gov/qfd/states/00000.html
Women and Affirmative Action
Progress of Women: 1959-1995
Poverty   Unempl.  Labor    Median   FT, YR male/
Year   Rate      Rate     Partic.  Income   female ratio
--------------------------------------------------------
1959     NA       5.9%    35.0%   $5,736     NA
1960     NA       5.9     35.5     5,804    .607
1961     NA       7.2     35.4     5,832    .592
1962     NA       6.2     35.6     6,064    .593
1963     NA       6.5     35.8     6,106    .589
1964     NA       6.2     36.3     6,372    .591
1965     NA       5.5     37.1     6,591    .599
1966    16.3%     4.8     38.3     6,896    .576
1967    15.8      5.2     39.0     7,353    .578
1968    14.3      4.8     39.6     7,937    .582
1969    13.6      4.7     40.7     8,019    .589
1970    14.0      5.9     40.8     8,027    .594
1971    14.1      6.9     40.4     8,280    .595
1972    13.4      6.6     41.0     8,675    .579
1973    12.5      6.0     42.0     8,779    .566
1974    12.9      6.7     42.6     8,801    .588
1975    13.8      9.3     42.0     8,926    .588
1976    13.4      8.6     43.2     8,922    .602
1977    13.0      8.2     44.5     9,241    .589
1978    13.0      7.2     46.4     8,932    .594
1979    13.2      6.8     47.5     8,716    .597
1980    14.7      7.4     47.7     8,860    .602
1981    15.8      7.9     48.0     8,978    .592
1982    16.5      9.4     47.7     9,126    .617
1983    16.8      9.2     48.0     9,402    .636
1984    15.9      7.6     49.5     9,796    .637
1985    15.6      7.4     50.4     9,940    .646
1986    15.2      7.1     51.4    10,290    .643
1987    15.0      6.2     52.5    10,821    .652
1988    14.5      5.6     53.4    11,129    .660
1989    14.4      5.4     54.3    11,502    .687
1990    15.2      5.5     54.3    11,418    .716
1991    16.0      6.4     53.7    11,399    .699
1992    16.6      7.0     53.8    11,317    .708
1993    16.9      6.6     54.1    11,329    .715
1994    16.3      6.0     55.3    11,466    .720
(huppie.com)

Notice that women's labor participation increased from 35% in 1959 to over 55% in 1994. During these years, the median income of women went from $5736 to $11,466. Lastly, in 1959, a woman earned about 61 cents for every dollar a man earned. By 1995, women earned 72 cents for every man's dollar, and 18% increase.

African Americans and Affirmative Action

Progress of African Americans: 1959-1993
Poverty   Unempl.   Median   Percent of
Year   Rate      Rate      Income   white median
--------------------------------------------------
1959    55.1%      NA     $5,998      44.6%
1960     NA      10.2%     6,200      47.0
1961     NA        NA      6,525      48.6
1962     NA        NA      6,814      49.4
1963     NA        NA      7,423      53.7
1964     NA        NA      7,929      56.2
1965     NA        NA      8,155      55.4
1966    41.8      7.3      8,837      60.0
1967    39.3      7.4      9,443      62.9
1968    34.7      6.7      9,918      63.2
1969    32.2      6.4     10,430      65.8
1970    33.5      8.2     10,858      69.1
1971    32.5      9.9     10,632      67.4
1972    33.3     10.0     11,399      69.3
1973    31.4      8.9     11,555      70.1
1974    30.3      9.9     10,797      68.1
1975    31.3     14.8     10,693      68.9
1976    31.1     13.1     10,983      70.3
1977    31.3     13.1     11,059      70.2
1978    30.6     11.9     10,908      70.3
1979    31.0     11.3     10,783      71.8
1980    32.5     14.3     10,520      71.0
1981    34.2     14.2     10,367      70.7
1982    35.6     18.9     10,372      70.0
1983    35.7     19.5     10,283      68.2
1984    33.8     15.9     10,529      68.3
1985    31.3     15.1     10,882      69.3
1986    31.1     14.5     11,020      68.0
1987    32.4     13.0     11,425      69.5
1988    31.3     11.7     11,859      69.7
1989    30.7     11.4     12,052      69.7
1990    31.9     11.3     11,711      68.7
1991    32.7     12.4     11,471      68.8
1992    33.4     14.1     11,252      68.5
1993    33.1     12.9     11,614      70.7
(huppie.com)

During this period of about 40 years, African American living at or below the poverty line decreased from 55.1% to 33.1%.  In addition, median income more the doubled.

 White Male Americans and Affirmative Action

 Because affirmative action gives preference to women and minorities, it may harm white males' chances at success. This group makes up about 35% of the American population.(census.gov) Affirmative Action may harm them in a number of ways. White males may be laid off at work so the employer may fulfill the mandatory white-to-colored employee ratio, not accepted to a university due to preference towards other groups, or not be given a job for the same reason.

Affirmative Action's Impact on White Males

Sources:
http://acluok.org/tag/sq759/
https://www.sos.ok.gov/gov/proposed_questions.aspx
Date:10-24-11
 


Affirmative Action and State Question 759
Affirmative Action is the act of showing preference to minorities and the disadvantaged based on ethnicity, background, gender, income level, and so on. Affirmative action may apply in colleges, universities, and workplaces. Supporters of affirmative action state that it promotes diversity and equal opportunity. Opponents of affirmative action call it reverse discrimination.


Proposed by Senator Rob Johnson, state question 759 bans affirmative action in in the entire state. In 2012, voters will decide whether or not to pass this this amendment of the state constitution. The state question allows discrimination in certain specific cases such as when gender affects the qualification of a person.
The exact wording of the bill is quoted below:

This measure adds a new section to the State Constitution. It adds Section 36 to Article II.

The measure deals with three areas of government action. These areas are employment, education and contracting.
In these areas, the measure does not allow affirmative action programs. Affirmative action programs give preferred treatment based on race, color or gender. They also give preferred treatment based on ethnicity or national origin. Discrimination on these bases is also not permitted.
The measure permits affirmative action in three instances. 1. When gender is a bonafide qualification, it is allowed. 2. Existing court orders and consent decrees that require preferred treatment will continue and can be followed. 3. Affirmative action is allowed when needed to keep or obtain federal funds.
The measure applies to the State and its agencies. It applies to counties, cities and towns. It applies to school districts. It applies to other State subdivisions.
The measure applies only to actions taken after its approval by the people. (sos.ok.gov)
Arguments For Affirmative Action
1. Promotes Equality in Society
  • Compensates minorities for past injustices.
  •  Increases education levels and financial standings of women and minorities to a basic standard .
  • Gives those with disabilities or disadvantages a head start to "level the  playing field"
2. Diversity
  • Since past laws greatly reduced diversity, only present laws like affirmative action will bring it back.
  • Diversity in college, schools. and work places is healthy for the environment.
3. It's Fair
  • Affirmative action does not necessarily give a less qualified person a white man's job, but rather it may be used for a tie-breaker between 2  equally qualified people.

Arguments Against Affirmative Action

  1. It's Not Ensuring Justice:
  • It's reverse discrimination. It wrongs the white population-nearly 3/4ths of the American population.
  • Affirmative action is supposedly instituted to combat past racism and to promote diversity. This is not the case. Affirmative action goes against Martin Luther King's dream of a "colorblind society."
  • Affirmative action does not necessarily benefit the unfortunate. For example, a daughter of a rich African American may be preferred over a hardworking son of a poor, white man because of her race and gender
    2. It Degrades Women and Minorities:
  • It devalues the hard work of minorities and women by "playing easy" with them.
  • It stereotypes women and minorities as less capable of success. This is an insult to the hard work and achievements of women and minorities.
    3. It's a Fail-Fail Situation for All Americans 
  • It obviously harms the chances of educational and economical success of white Americans and males.
  • It harms the its beneficiaries: Researcher Thomas Sowell states, "Today many Americans will refuse to visit a black physician or dentist because of their assumption that he or she was admitted both to medical school and to the position held through 'special preferences', set-aside quotas, and relaxed standards."
  • Affirmative Action encourages minority groups to depend on relaxed standards. It discourages them to challenge themselves and achieve despite their disadvantages, financial or otherwise. 
Sources
Date: 10-15-11


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