Reply to Affirmative Action should be income-based, not race-based

Forum Index » Political Discussion

Reply to "Affirmative Action should be income-based, not race-based"

Subject:

Emoticons





More smilies

Text Color: Font: Close Marks

[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]I grew up in an upper-middle class area, and the neighbors were all engineers, Ph.D.'s, accountants, and economists. Why should the black children in the neighborhood get a "leg-up" over high-achieving poor whites in Brooklyn (or wherever) when it comes to getting into a competitive college?

Affirmative action should be based on a combination of better-than-average-grades and family income. This could be accomplished by giving "special chance" points to the top 5% in every school who ALSO has a family income of less than $100,000. In the inner-city and poor rural areas, just about everyone is from a sub-$100,000 family, so the top 5% get the special-chance points. Thus, in a crappy DC public school with 400 graduating seniors, about 20 would get the AA points. In a wealthy Bethesda W school, perhaps only 1 or 2 would (because a high family income would disqualify the others).

In addition, kids qualifying for special-chance points would get the equivalent of tuition of the state's 4-year public university. End result is the exceptional kids from lower-middle-class (or poorer) families get the leg up in admission AND tuition support. Race would not be a factor (although since black families earn less than whites, on average, they would still benefit disproptionately).

[/quote]

Affirmative Action was sold to us as giving the school/job opportunity to a black person over a white person of equal merit to make up for historical discriminatory practices. While by definition this was a racist practice,  we as a nation supported it as a reasonable accommodation to address past wrongs. This was in the 70s. 
Nearly 50 years later we see what AA is in practice. A rank racist practice giving jobs and educational slots to vastly less qualified individuals based solely  on race to discriminate against Asians and whites.

Like Marxism... what sounds great on paper in practice results in vile and odious policy. Worse it’s addictive because it makes those who practice it feel good about themselves (a dopaminergic response) thus stimulating them to perpetuate and expand the practice perpetrating ever greater harms upon society.[/quote]
OP here. And that is what is so brilliant (taking a bow!) about my plan. It takes race completely out of the picture, yet at the same time, a poor black kid from a bad neighborhood who is smarter than average or works harder than average (or both) gets a leg up. As it should be. But concurrent with that, a so-so black kid in a middle-class neighborhood should not get preferential treatment over a poor whole kid in a impoverished WV town who is among the top 5% in his class.

[/quote]

Options

	Disable HTML in this message
	Disable BB Code in this message
	Disable smilies in this message

Review message

Search Recent Topics Hottest Topics