Monumental change often occurs imperceptibly, and we don't know it's happened until sometime after it occurs.
It appears to me that racial and ethnic discrimination in employment compensation has come to an end. Not everywhere or with respect to everyone , but pretty clearly on a national statistical level. Personal prejudice and bias is impossible to completely eradicate. However things have changed and for the better, even though politicians and advocates will continue with the old narrative that discrimination is endemic and pervasive in the business world.
Anecdotally I've observed that discrimination in the workplace based on race, ethnicity and gender has all but disappeared. Consistent with a developing set of laws and principles, corporations and government have been vigilant in efforts to elimination racial discrimination in the workplace. It's working.
This view was statistically confirmed in a report I recently read by a University of Chicago Nobel Prize winning economist, James J. Heckman. While his report dealt with the importance of early childhood education, he concluded that more than overt discrimination now drives the achievement gap in the US between Whites, Blacks and Hispanics. He argues that skills now determine success. If you factor in skills (meaning "smarts" including conscientiousness, perseverance and sociability), the wage gap between Whites versus Blacks and Hispanics disappears.
For those who have similar skills ,wage discrimination no longer exist. Blacks and Hispanic men and women who have similar academic and personal skills make the same (or in the case of Black and Hispanic women more) than their White counterparts.
His 2011 study showed using all Black men, the wages for Blacks as a percentage of all White men's wages was 75%. However when adjusted for skills that gap closed to 94%. For Hispanic men, the percentage went from 85% unadjusted to 100% after adjustment. Interestingly , as to Black women, the percentage which was 83 % reversed to 112% after adjustment for skills ; and for Hispanic women from 93% to 117%, after adjustment. I wonder if anyone will start complaining about that "reverse" gap.
The struggle still remains to enhance those skills among minorities through education, parenting and mentoring. However, it is real progress that institutional discrimination in wages in the US apparently no longer exist based on race or ethnicity with respect to those with similar skills.
While I have expressed great skepticism over the politicized use of statistic to fit a political agenda, these figures came from a study which focused on early childhood education and not a study of wage discrimination. As such the author presumably had no particular political agenda in mind on this issue.
The conclusion I take away from this study is that educated Blacks and Hispanics who are conscientious and have good people skills will not be institutionally discriminated against based on their race or ethnicity.
While more needs to be done about those without skills, this is quite a positive societal accomplishment in this country and should be recognized as such, rather than just repeating the old litany of endemic and persistent institutional discrimination.
Eric
I am not good with numbers, but I know enough to know they can be used to support either side of an argument. You didn't reference EEOC stats and I took a few minutes to pull up a few:
ReplyDelete- the number of charges filed (99,000) was the greatest since 1997
- I understand this doesn't mean they actually experienced discrimination, but don't try convincing them it's gone away
- 4300 cause findings were issued in 2011 (this number has been steady over the last several years) - at least the EEOC thought there were 4300 instances of discrimination
- resolutions and settlements were up to the tune of $364 million (excluding litigation)
- lawsuits declined in 2011, the fine lawyers would say because staff in enforcement and legal has been inadequate and under republican administrations those vacancies were intentionally not filled because they love the picture your analysis portrays. Re: staffing, they filled lots of vacancies in year 2 of Obama administration and of course federal government hiring has been frozen for a while.
- race based charges are up, as well as their resolutions and cause findings of race charges has been constant
- race based lawsuits are not identified.
Today I met with an African Male (professional, degreed) to present my investigation report of his race/gender allegations. The evidence did not support a conclusion of discrimination and that's what I told him (in a detailed discussion). The conversation I had with the EEO Manager went something like: the administrators (who for the last 2 years happen to be white women) did not invest the same energy and attention to assist him in advancing his career as they did with others, including another white woman (but that wasn't his allegation) and there is no evaluative reason for this. Neither did he take the kind of initiative he could have and whether that was because he's lazy or felt generally defeated, I believe it's the latter. This goes to one of your points about not enhancing the skills of minorities and why is that - DISCRIMINATION if you're doing it for whites. This stuff isn't easy to figure out. The statistics presented in your blog and the statistics from EEOC do not reflect the real work place. Your anecdotal observation may have more to do with your experience and those with whom you work and interact rather than most work environments. Has progress been made - YES - and we can agree that this progress should be celebrated. And, there is much work to be done.