Affirmative action hasn't worked.

Myth: Affirmative Action hasn't worked.

Fact: Statistics show gains for all discriminated groups.



Summary

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.



Argument

Many critics of affirmative action believe it has failed to achieve its stated goal of equal employment opportunity. A few even believe that it has done more harm than good. A review of the statistics, however, shows that both minorities and women have made substantial progress towards equality in the last several decades.

Before reviewing the relevant statistics, it would be helpful to build a timeline of important dates in affirmative action history.

An affirmative action timeline

In 1961, John F. Kennedy signed an executive order that intended the end of discrimination in federal contracting. "The Contractor will take affirmative action, to ensure that applicants are employed, and that employees are treated during employment, without regard to their race, creed, color or national origin." (1) The act did not mandate quotas, only discrimination-free employment practices.

The Civil Rights Act of 1964 broadened this policy. Title IV declared that "No person in the United States shall, on the grounds of race, color or national origin, be excluded from participation in, be denied benefits of, or be subjected to discrimination under any program or activity receiving Federal financial assistance."

The subject of first quotas arose in 1965, when President Johnson gave the commencement address at Harvard University:

Not long afterwards, Johnson signed an order "to promote the full realization of equal employment opportunity through a positive, continuing program…" (2) In 1967, this order was expanded to prohibit discrimination on the basis of sex.

In 1971, the Department of Labor under Richard Nixon issued an order requiring all federal contractors to develop "an acceptable affirmative action program," including "an analysis of areas within which the contractor is deficient in the utilization of minority groups and women, and further, goals and timetables to which the contractor's good faith efforts must be directed to correct the deficiencies." (3) By now, affirmative action goals had become the full-fledged policy of U.S. government contracting.

The results of affirmative action

A 1995 study by Murrell and Jones found that affirmative action has increased the representation of women and minorities across all levels of employment in the U.S. and within organizations that were once exclusively male. They also found it resulted in higher employment participation rates, increased earnings, and gains in educational attainment for women and minorities. (4)

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:

Employment level of various groups in managerial and professional specialty occupations (5)

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

By comparison, women comprised 51.2 percent of the 1995 U.S. population; blacks comprised 12.6 percent, and Hispanics, 10.2 percent. (6)

A few caveats are in order, however. The above chart does not show how these groups are doing in general; it only shows how each group's best wage earners are doing. At the bottom end of the scale, members in all these groups are losing ground. Another important note is that for all the above progress, these groups are still running into a glass ceiling when it comes to being promoted to upper executive positions. According to the 1995 Glass Ceiling Commission report, 95% of senior level managers in Fortune 1000 industrial and Fortune 500 service industries are white men, despite their being only 33 percent of the population.

Let's explore the benefits of affirmative action for women and blacks separately:

Affirmative action for women

An ACLU briefing paper on affirmative action reports: "Six million women have received opportunities in employment and education directly because of affirmative action programs. Between 1970 and 1990, the proportion of women physicians doubled from 7.6% to 16.9%. From 1972 to 1979 -- the years when affirmative action programs were most vigorously enforced -- the number of women becoming accountants, lawyers and judges, and school administrators increased substantially. And during the last 10 years the overall number of black professional women grew 125%." (7)

The following chart shows the leading economic indicators for women since 1959. Keep in mind that affirmative action for women did not start until the late 60s; it was most vigorously enforced in the 70s, and less enforced in the 80s. Also note that these numbers do not tell their own story; they require further analysis.

Female economic indicators, individual (Median income: 15 years and older, 1994 CPI-U-X1 adjusted dollars. Female labor force participation rate: 16 years and older. Income ratio: full-time, year-round female to male median earnings) (8)

       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

Two things stand out in this chart. First, the percentage of women joining the labor force has grown substantially, from 36 to 55 percent between 1964 and 1994. Second, women made roughly 59 cents to every man's dollar for over 20 years -- until 1982, when that ratio suddenly began rising. Conservatives would like to credit Reaganomics for this second trend, hoping to disprove the supposed benefits of affirmative action. But the real reason is that it took women time to climb the promotion ladder.

To see this point more clearly, recall that there are two types of jobs in our economy. The first group is managerial/professional jobs, which are the best paying. In 1994, they comprised 27.5 percent of all jobs in the U.S. (9) The second group is all other jobs, which generally pay lower and comprise about three fourths of all jobs. Now, before women can be hired to managerial/professional jobs, they must qualify for them first -- which generally means they must attend college. But college acceptance practices have also been discriminatory, and affirmative action programs had to fight this fight as well. After women began graduating in greater numbers, they required yet more time to rise up through the ranks to reach the managerial/professional jobs. For these reasons, we see a long lag between the implementation of affirmative action and its results.

The growing percentage of female managers also has a snowballing effect. They are less likely to discriminate against other women at hiring time; therefore, they create larger talent pools of qualified females from which to promote more managers. But again, this dynamic took time to accelerate.

Affirmative action for blacks

For blacks, the history of affirmative action reads a bit differently. Blacks have always worked the nation's lowest-paying and most menial jobs. Unlike women, blacks were underrepresented not only in managerial/professional jobs, but ordinary middle class jobs as well. Because the qualifications for the latter are less than the former, black gains were accomplished more easily and quickly. Their relatively quicker success also owed much to the fact that affirmative action began addressing racial discrimination many years before gender discrimination.

The following chart shows the leading economic indicators for blacks since 1959:

Black economic indicators, individual (Median income: 15 years and older, 1994 CPI-U-X1 adjusted dollars) (10)

       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
1994    30.6     11.5*    12,248      74.1*

*Cannot be compared to previous years.

As these charts show, affirmative action has indeed been successful in helping women and minorities; the job just isn't finished yet.

Return to Overview

Endnotes:

1. John F. Kennedy's Executive Order 10925, establishing the President's Committee on Equal Employment Opportunity, March 1961.

2. Lyndon B. Johnson's Executive Order 11246, 1965.

3. U.S. Department of Labor, Revised Order No. 4, December, 1971.

4. A. J. Murrell & R. Jones, The paradox of affirmative action: Examining its impact and future for women and minorities in employment. Manuscript submitted for publication. Reported in Faye Crosby, Audrey Murrell, John Dovidio, Rupert Nacoste, Anthony Pratkanis, Janet Helms, "Affirmative Action: Who Benefits?", a briefing paper of the American Psychological Association, Society for the Psychological Study of Social Issues, Society for the Psychological Study of Ethnic Minority Issues.

5. U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Series ID: lfu112500000000, lfu112500000002, lfu112500000030, lfu112500000050, lfu112500000060, lfu112500000070, lfu112500000080.

6. U.S. Bureau of the Census, Current Population Reports, P25-1095, P25-1104 and unpublished data.

7. ACLU Briefing Paper on California affirmative action.

8. Poverty rate: U.S. Bureau of the Census, Income and Poverty, 1993. Unemployment rate: U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Series ID: lfu21000002. Civilian employment/population ratio: U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Series ID : lfu1600002. Income and income ratio: U.S. Bureau of the Census, Current Population Reports, Series P60.

9. U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Employment and Monthly Earnings, 1994.

10. Poverty: Figures before 1990 from U.S. Bureau of the Census, 1960-89. Figures from 1990 on from U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. Unemployment: U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. Income: U.S. Bureau of the Census, Current Population Reports, Series P60. Percentage of white median: derived from same income table by Steve Kangas.