WEBVTT - The Problem With Affirmative Action 0:00:07.000 --> 0:00:09.280 Up to now, we focused on the origins of the 0:00:09.360 --> 0:00:13.119 racial wealth gap, how Black people have been consistently excluded 0:00:13.160 --> 0:00:17.119 from building wealth and ensuring their own financial stability since 0:00:17.160 --> 0:00:20.080 the end of slavery. Today, we're going to look at 0:00:20.120 --> 0:00:23.119 one of the first attempts to address the disparities to 0:00:23.200 --> 0:00:27.120 make America a more equal society, to level the playing field. 0:00:27.600 --> 0:00:32.440 We're talking about affirmative action and education. This starts more 0:00:32.520 --> 0:00:36.480 or less in September with an executive order that makes 0:00:36.520 --> 0:00:40.400 new rules for federal contractors. It's not enough to not 0:00:40.560 --> 0:00:44.720 discriminate that's already illegal. The order says it's time to 0:00:44.880 --> 0:00:49.120 ensure no one's being left out. President Lyndon Johnson was 0:00:49.200 --> 0:00:52.720 clear about his rationale here. He is speaking at graduation 0:00:52.760 --> 0:00:56.200 at Howard University, the historically black college in Washington, d C. 0:00:57.160 --> 0:00:59.800 You do not take a person who for a year 0:01:00.280 --> 0:01:06.560 has been hobbled by change and liberating bringing up to 0:01:06.640 --> 0:01:10.080 the starting line of a race, and then say you 0:01:10.120 --> 0:01:14.200 are free to compete with all the others and still 0:01:14.520 --> 0:01:19.560 justly believe that you have been completely fair. That's the 0:01:19.560 --> 0:01:22.800 theory behind affirmative action. It was the idea that it 0:01:22.840 --> 0:01:26.240 took work to unlock opportunity in a more equitable way. 0:01:26.720 --> 0:01:31.679 Black people in particular were entitled to additional consideration. This 0:01:31.800 --> 0:01:36.440 did two big things. One, it set aside government contracts 0:01:36.480 --> 0:01:41.360 to minority owned businesses. It also radically changed college admissions. 0:01:42.200 --> 0:01:46.240 Colleges and universities tweaked their admissions policies to enroll more 0:01:46.280 --> 0:01:51.120 African Americans and other minorities. Five years after Johnson signs 0:01:51.160 --> 0:01:56.440 that executive order, roughly of colleges and universities have some 0:01:56.520 --> 0:02:00.520 kind of affirmative action in place, and black student enrollment 0:02:00.960 --> 0:02:05.160 was going up. So in that regard, it's working, but 0:02:05.680 --> 0:02:10.000 it's not universally popular. Far too many affirmative action programs 0:02:10.400 --> 0:02:14.560 divide rather than unite. Our children and grandchildren feel no 0:02:14.680 --> 0:02:18.919 responsibility for the conduct of their ancestors and the mistakes 0:02:18.960 --> 0:02:22.000 of America's past, and that is as it should be. 0:02:23.639 --> 0:02:27.440 A black California businessman named Ward Connorly waged war on 0:02:27.480 --> 0:02:31.600 affirmative action in his state. Connorley was also a regent 0:02:31.639 --> 0:02:34.400 in the University of California system, and he was the 0:02:34.480 --> 0:02:40.080 driving force behind Proposition too oh nine, California ballot initiative 0:02:40.160 --> 0:02:43.960 to end affirmative action in the state. That's not what 0:02:44.040 --> 0:02:48.200 the text of the ballot initiatives said, though in fact 0:02:48.400 --> 0:02:52.160 it didn't even mention affirmative action by name. It instead 0:02:52.400 --> 0:02:57.880 framed it as anti discrimination section the state shall not 0:02:58.040 --> 0:03:03.000 discriminate against or grant refferential treatment to any individual or 0:03:03.040 --> 0:03:07.480 group on the basis of race, sex, color, ethnicity, or 0:03:07.600 --> 0:03:11.920 national origin in the operation of public employment, public education, 0:03:12.440 --> 0:03:18.519 or public contracting the preferential treatment it refers to. That's 0:03:18.560 --> 0:03:22.360 what would be the death knell for affirmative action. Connorly 0:03:22.400 --> 0:03:25.920 acknowledged that those kinds of measures had been necessary, but 0:03:26.080 --> 0:03:29.200 he argued it wasn't anymore. It had gone from being 0:03:29.200 --> 0:03:32.639 a transitional remedy to an entitlement, a crutch that had 0:03:32.680 --> 0:03:35.840 outlived its usefulness for black people in our reliance on 0:03:35.920 --> 0:03:39.840 affirmative action. The time has indeed come to let go. 0:03:40.720 --> 0:03:43.840 We cannot forever look through the rear view mirror at 0:03:43.840 --> 0:03:48.600 America's mistakes. We must look through the windshield at its opportunities. 0:03:48.960 --> 0:03:51.440 It was a radical position for a black man to take. 0:03:52.200 --> 0:03:55.960 Civil rights groups roundly opposed the measure. Connor Ley said 0:03:56.000 --> 0:03:59.480 he was called an uncle Tom, a lackey, and a sellout, 0:04:00.680 --> 0:04:05.520 but he won. Prop To nine passed with of the vote, 0:04:06.320 --> 0:04:11.320 including Connorley with later brag of the black vote. By 0:04:11.400 --> 0:04:15.840 the late nineties, affirmative action in California public universities was dead. 0:04:16.839 --> 0:04:24.600 California's is the premier laboratory for testing this experiment. If 0:04:24.600 --> 0:04:27.719 this experiment works in California, my friends, it works anywhere. 0:04:28.560 --> 0:04:34.239 It fails in California, its failure can be predicted throughout 0:04:34.279 --> 0:04:38.200 the land. The United States was about to find out whether, 0:04:38.520 --> 0:04:51.479 as Connorley said, the experiment worked. The data shows that 0:04:51.560 --> 0:04:55.200 the median white family has ten times more wealth than 0:04:55.279 --> 0:04:58.359 the average black family. One of the drivers of that 0:04:58.440 --> 0:05:02.400 wealth gap is redlining. When it comes to understanding financial 0:05:02.440 --> 0:05:06.039 inequality in this country, economists often point to the absence 0:05:06.080 --> 0:05:11.880 of African American generational wealth. See the pleasant a plant 0:05:12.760 --> 0:05:15.800 walk from California to Night a picture of how the 0:05:15.880 --> 0:05:19.360 nation's largest university system may be transformed. Now that it's 0:05:19.400 --> 0:05:22.880 a pervative action program is going to be ended. It's 0:05:22.880 --> 0:05:25.960 a trend propelled not just by economic forces, but by 0:05:26.040 --> 0:05:30.839 white racism and local white political and economic power. It's 0:05:30.920 --> 0:05:33.960 much easier to integrate a lunch counter than it is 0:05:34.000 --> 0:05:36.960 to guarantee an annual income, for instance, to get rid 0:05:36.960 --> 0:05:47.680 of poverty. Welcome back to the paycheck. I'm Jackie Simmons 0:05:48.120 --> 0:05:51.479 and I am Rebecca Greenfield. The difference economically between having 0:05:51.480 --> 0:05:54.680 a college degree and not having one is huge. For 0:05:54.760 --> 0:05:57.840 full time, year round workers in their mid twenties and thirties, 0:05:58.279 --> 0:06:01.040 having at least a bachelor's degree is worth an extra 0:06:01.120 --> 0:06:04.719 twenty three thousand dollars a year in income, even taking 0:06:04.800 --> 0:06:09.240 student debt into account. More education predicts higher incomes and 0:06:09.279 --> 0:06:12.520 more wealth at every level. For one, it opens up 0:06:12.560 --> 0:06:16.479 more better paying job opportunities. College graduates make more money 0:06:16.520 --> 0:06:18.640 than people with a high school degree or even just 0:06:18.720 --> 0:06:21.960 some college. People with a graduate degree make more money 0:06:21.960 --> 0:06:26.240 than college grads. It's not just jobs. People with a 0:06:26.320 --> 0:06:29.960 college or advanced degree are more likely to get benefits 0:06:30.000 --> 0:06:32.719 like health insurance through their work, which adds an extra 0:06:32.800 --> 0:06:37.880 layer of financial security. Experts also believe more education leads 0:06:37.920 --> 0:06:41.560 to better financial decision making, so people are making more 0:06:41.600 --> 0:06:45.839 money and they're making better choices with it. There's another 0:06:45.880 --> 0:06:49.400 reason black families seek out a college education. My father 0:06:49.520 --> 0:06:53.520 is very keenly aware of the difficulty of just simply 0:06:53.560 --> 0:06:56.360 being black. You know, had an opportunity to to learn 0:06:56.400 --> 0:06:58.680 to read, write, to do those things that will make 0:06:58.720 --> 0:07:01.640 them competitive at least to fight back. He would fight back, 0:07:01.680 --> 0:07:04.400 but you know, you could always be dismissed because you 0:07:04.400 --> 0:07:06.960 couldn't do something or whatever it was. So he always 0:07:07.000 --> 0:07:09.360 taught us it was important to get an education. That's 0:07:09.360 --> 0:07:12.800 Shirley Webber. She's had a long career in California higher 0:07:12.880 --> 0:07:16.880 education and politics. In January, she was sworn in as 0:07:16.880 --> 0:07:20.880 a Secretary of State. She's a huge defender of affirmative 0:07:20.920 --> 0:07:24.360 action and says it was critical to her success at 0:07:24.400 --> 0:07:27.920 every point in her academic career. Without that extra step, 0:07:28.120 --> 0:07:30.480 you know, I may would have done okay in life, 0:07:30.760 --> 0:07:32.760 but I doubt if I would have if I would 0:07:32.760 --> 0:07:34.840 have gotten a PhD by the time I was twenty six, 0:07:35.400 --> 0:07:36.840 and I doubt if I would have been a professor 0:07:36.840 --> 0:07:39.480 at the age I would have been struggling trying to 0:07:39.480 --> 0:07:40.800 figure out what I was gonna do and how I 0:07:40.920 --> 0:07:43.480 was going to do it. That extra opportunity helped to 0:07:43.560 --> 0:07:46.679 get me to a level that I could actually excel, 0:07:47.200 --> 0:07:49.840 you know, demonstrate that I could do those things despite 0:07:49.880 --> 0:07:52.520 the fact coming from a very poor background. So my 0:07:52.640 --> 0:07:56.239 first contact with affirmative action was really myself. Many black 0:07:56.240 --> 0:08:00.640 professionals probably benefited from some kind of affirmative action. I 0:08:00.760 --> 0:08:04.080 might have two. I graduated in the late eighties and 0:08:04.120 --> 0:08:08.120 applied to a million schools, including some in California, and 0:08:08.240 --> 0:08:11.200 was told race might be one factor that could help 0:08:11.200 --> 0:08:14.440 me get a second look. I can't definitively say it 0:08:14.480 --> 0:08:18.320 worked or not, but fast forward thirty years, I've definitely 0:08:18.320 --> 0:08:22.120 had my share of professional success. Kelsey Butler is a 0:08:22.120 --> 0:08:25.920 reporter at Bloomberg. She applied to college about fifteen years 0:08:25.960 --> 0:08:31.240 after I did. Hey, Kelsey, Hi Jackie. So if I 0:08:31.320 --> 0:08:36.960 understand you weren't very comfortable thinking of yourself as having 0:08:37.000 --> 0:08:41.360 benefited from affirmative action, is that right? Yeah, that's true. 0:08:41.520 --> 0:08:45.600 I mean it's complicated because you know, when I applied 0:08:45.640 --> 0:08:49.000 to college in two thousand five, being black and Latina, 0:08:49.440 --> 0:08:51.559 it might have been something that got me a second 0:08:51.640 --> 0:08:54.960 look or even got me in the door with admissions officers. 0:08:55.720 --> 0:08:59.600 I honestly have no idea, but I feel like since then, 0:09:00.840 --> 0:09:03.720 in a lot of majority white spaces, you know, the 0:09:03.840 --> 0:09:07.839 term affirmative action higher or you're here because of affirmative 0:09:07.840 --> 0:09:11.760 action has been almost used as like a jab against me, 0:09:11.920 --> 0:09:16.960 and it kind of sours you almost on the concept 0:09:17.800 --> 0:09:21.319 I spent a lot of time while reporting this listening 0:09:21.360 --> 0:09:25.440 to all the arguments against affirmative action, lots of tape, 0:09:25.600 --> 0:09:28.840 lots of recordings. I thought a lot about the racist 0:09:28.960 --> 0:09:32.600 roots of a lot of the arguments against affirmative action, 0:09:33.760 --> 0:09:37.679 and also kind of made me think about, well, if 0:09:37.720 --> 0:09:40.920 it didn't exist, then what really is there? You know, 0:09:41.000 --> 0:09:45.280 the doors to a lot of institutions would be closed 0:09:45.280 --> 0:09:50.880 to a lot of people. And is my discomfort you know, 0:09:51.400 --> 0:09:55.280 someone saying something ignorant? It seems really small when you 0:09:55.320 --> 0:10:08.480 think about it that way. One of the problems with 0:10:08.520 --> 0:10:11.400 affirmative action does it gives certain people a leg up, 0:10:12.040 --> 0:10:15.720 maybe without them even knowing. And some people think that's unfair, 0:10:16.320 --> 0:10:19.080 even if it is creating a more level playing field. 0:10:20.040 --> 0:10:23.960 But what happens when that leg up goes away? Does 0:10:24.000 --> 0:10:27.640 that make things more fair? When California put a hard 0:10:27.640 --> 0:10:30.440 stop to affirmative action with Prop two and nine, it 0:10:30.520 --> 0:10:32.960 did do what connor Ley said, It's set up a 0:10:33.040 --> 0:10:37.200 huge experiment. The state had three decades of strong affirmative 0:10:37.240 --> 0:10:40.720 action measures and then all of a sudden it didn't. 0:10:42.000 --> 0:10:44.240 We asked Kelsey to find some answers about what that 0:10:44.280 --> 0:10:48.600 meant for black wealth. So Kelsey, Where do we start 0:10:49.360 --> 0:10:52.479 well in terms of getting black students to college, Affirmative 0:10:52.520 --> 0:10:57.800 action definitely worked. In five only four point seven percent 0:10:57.960 --> 0:11:01.240 of African American adults had four more years of college 0:11:01.320 --> 0:11:04.960 education according to the U S Census. It starts to 0:11:04.960 --> 0:11:07.760 go up pretty quickly after that, especially when you consider 0:11:07.880 --> 0:11:10.240 it typically takes at least four years to earn a 0:11:10.280 --> 0:11:14.520 bachelor's By nineteen eighty, eight point four percent of Black 0:11:14.520 --> 0:11:19.400 adults have a degree, almost double within fifteen years and 0:11:19.480 --> 0:11:24.760 another fifteen years, so by a little more than thirteen 0:11:24.760 --> 0:11:27.400 percent of Black adults have a four year degree or higher. 0:11:27.800 --> 0:11:31.120 And that's before Prop. Two oh nine, Right, yeah, And 0:11:31.200 --> 0:11:36.640 actually in California the numbers are slightly higher. By seventeen 0:11:36.640 --> 0:11:39.680 point five percent of African Americans have a college degree 0:11:39.760 --> 0:11:43.079 or higher. Another way to put it is, in about 0:11:43.240 --> 0:11:45.920 thirty years, the number of Black adult in California with 0:11:45.960 --> 0:11:48.360 a four year degree has gone from about one in 0:11:48.480 --> 0:11:52.240 seventeen to better than one in six And this was 0:11:52.280 --> 0:11:54.880 after some of the earliest affirmative action measures had been 0:11:54.920 --> 0:11:58.000 watered down. What do you mean by water down? Well, 0:11:58.040 --> 0:12:02.840 Originally some institutions used a straight quota system, setting aside 0:12:02.880 --> 0:12:05.600 a certain number of seats for black and Hispanic students 0:12:06.600 --> 0:12:09.640 until nineteen seventy seven and the U. S. Supreme Court 0:12:09.679 --> 0:12:14.000 case known as the Baki case. Baki was Alan Baki, 0:12:14.520 --> 0:12:18.120 a white man and an aspiring doctor. He wanted to 0:12:18.120 --> 0:12:20.959 go to medical school at U C. Davis in VY three. 0:12:22.040 --> 0:12:25.280 The school was new and the student body was overwhelmingly white, 0:12:25.600 --> 0:12:28.160 so they decided to set aside seats for applicants they 0:12:28.200 --> 0:12:34.120 called disadvantage, basically a euphemism for minorities. Baki had good 0:12:34.240 --> 0:12:37.280 MCAT scores and his interviewer described him as a well 0:12:37.400 --> 0:12:41.800 qualified candidate, but he didn't get in. He complained about 0:12:41.800 --> 0:12:44.760 what he thought was a reverse discrimination and was encouraged 0:12:44.760 --> 0:12:47.640 to apply again, and he was rejected a second time, 0:12:48.880 --> 0:12:51.080 so he sued and his case made its way to 0:12:51.120 --> 0:12:55.079 the Supreme Court. Six of the nine justices wrote opinions 0:12:55.080 --> 0:12:57.240 in the case, and when you look at them, it's 0:12:57.240 --> 0:13:00.480 really clear how divided they are. Some of um said 0:13:00.559 --> 0:13:05.160 race based quotas were clearly unconstitutional. Others said it was 0:13:05.240 --> 0:13:08.800 ridiculous to require schools to ignore racing admissions because of 0:13:08.800 --> 0:13:11.880 how black people had been held back throughout US history, 0:13:12.440 --> 0:13:15.720 and what was the controlling opinion Justice Lewis Powell tried 0:13:15.760 --> 0:13:19.160 to bridge the divide. He said, if there's a quote 0:13:19.280 --> 0:13:23.680 compelling state interests, race can be considered. In my view, 0:13:23.760 --> 0:13:26.520 the only state interests that fairly may be viewed as 0:13:26.559 --> 0:13:31.439 compelling on this record is the interest of a university 0:13:31.480 --> 0:13:35.040 in a diverse student body. The court didn't strike down 0:13:35.080 --> 0:13:39.280 all affirmative action. In fact, Powell quotes the admissions policy 0:13:39.320 --> 0:13:42.320 at Harvard as an example of university that's doing it right. 0:13:42.679 --> 0:13:45.079 He even attached a copy of the policy to his opinion. 0:13:45.559 --> 0:13:48.720 But you see Davis was doing it wrong. Yeah, basically 0:13:48.760 --> 0:13:52.120 because they'd set aside these rigid quotas. There were sixteen 0:13:52.160 --> 0:13:54.800 seats out of a hundred that were essentially off limits 0:13:54.800 --> 0:13:58.440 to white people. But you c Davis can rethink its policy, 0:13:58.520 --> 0:14:02.640 which Powell practically exem to do. Yet the way is 0:14:02.679 --> 0:14:07.840 open Todavis to adapt. The type of admissions program proved 0:14:07.840 --> 0:14:11.760 to be successful in so many of the universities and 0:14:11.840 --> 0:14:16.080 colleges of our country. So within ten years, basically quotas 0:14:16.080 --> 0:14:19.160 are out. That's interesting because it seems like that's what 0:14:19.240 --> 0:14:22.840 most people think of when they think of affirmative action. Yeah, 0:14:22.920 --> 0:14:26.640 that's a popular misconception for most of its history. It's 0:14:26.680 --> 0:14:29.200 not that at all, At least in college admissions. It's 0:14:29.320 --> 0:14:33.800 much more flexible. Powell's decision does something else that's really important. 0:14:34.320 --> 0:14:38.520 He basically wipes out Lyndon Johnson's rationale for affirmative action 0:14:39.600 --> 0:14:44.240 undoing general racial discrimination or imbalance. That's not a compelling interest. 0:14:44.760 --> 0:14:48.520 The only justification he allows is the diversity argument. So 0:14:48.640 --> 0:14:52.520 colleges are allowed to consider race. Yes, but here's the difference. 0:14:53.200 --> 0:14:56.680 Where before colleges were allowed to have quotas, now they're 0:14:56.680 --> 0:14:59.520 allowed to consider race as one factor in pursuit of 0:14:59.600 --> 0:15:03.200 diverse city and the student body. Most colleges worked within 0:15:03.280 --> 0:15:06.520 these new parameters, adding race onto a bunch of other 0:15:06.560 --> 0:15:10.280 admissions criteria. It was no longer the only factor, or 0:15:10.320 --> 0:15:14.280 even the predominant one, but it was still very explicitly considered. 0:15:14.760 --> 0:15:18.400 At California public schools, for example, black and Hispanic students 0:15:18.440 --> 0:15:20.720 had lower s A T score and g p A 0:15:20.800 --> 0:15:25.160 cutoffs for admissions. At places like Harvard, race is one 0:15:25.240 --> 0:15:28.360 factor of many that the school considers when letting students in. 0:15:31.880 --> 0:15:34.000 Black student enrollment drops for a bit, but then it 0:15:34.040 --> 0:15:38.440 continues to pick up. Even at U C. Davis Medical School, 0:15:38.600 --> 0:15:41.720 the overall minority student admit rate is higher five years 0:15:41.760 --> 0:15:43.960 after BAKY than it was in the five years before. 0:15:45.440 --> 0:15:49.080 By the case against affirmative action has a new twist. 0:15:49.880 --> 0:15:53.120 There was the controversial idea of protecting white people from 0:15:53.120 --> 0:15:57.000 the threat of reverse discrimination, but now it's also about 0:15:57.000 --> 0:15:59.520 asserting that black people no longer need a leg up 0:15:59.600 --> 0:16:04.240 or extra consideration of any kind. We've made it. That's 0:16:04.280 --> 0:16:07.000 the argument connorally makes the support Prop to OH nine. 0:16:08.200 --> 0:16:10.840 It's passage created an opportunity to find out whether he 0:16:10.920 --> 0:16:15.920 was right. Maybe we black people didn't need affirmative action 0:16:16.000 --> 0:16:22.960 after all. Since Prop TU and I took effect in 0:16:23.000 --> 0:16:26.120 the nineties, researchers have been looking at these questions, and 0:16:26.280 --> 0:16:28.640 enough time has passed if they think they have some answers. 0:16:29.640 --> 0:16:32.640 Zachary Bloomer is a PhD candidate and economics at the 0:16:32.720 --> 0:16:36.480 University of California, Berkeley. He looked at the impact of 0:16:36.520 --> 0:16:39.520 the law on black and brown students. We can compare 0:16:40.000 --> 0:16:44.400 the longer run outcomes of black and Latino university applicants 0:16:44.400 --> 0:16:48.200 in the years just before when affirmative action was still 0:16:48.240 --> 0:16:52.400 in place to the years just after when affirmative action 0:16:52.440 --> 0:16:55.720 had ended. We're just gonna follow those cohorts of students 0:16:55.720 --> 0:16:59.040 along over the next ten, fifteen, or even twenty years 0:16:59.480 --> 0:17:02.160 and ask what happened to them as a result of 0:17:02.200 --> 0:17:05.880 their more selective university enrollment under affirmative action. So that's 0:17:05.880 --> 0:17:08.520 what Bloomer did. He looked at where ten thousand college 0:17:08.560 --> 0:17:11.280 Albicans in California ended up without prop to OH nine, 0:17:11.720 --> 0:17:15.080 both in college and in their careers. What he found 0:17:15.160 --> 0:17:19.320 was pretty clear. Absent affirmative action, Black and Latino students 0:17:19.359 --> 0:17:22.960 are less likely to earn college degrees. They're less likely 0:17:23.000 --> 0:17:26.040 to earn graduate degrees, you know, following them another five 0:17:26.119 --> 0:17:29.440 years into the future. They're less likely to earn degrees 0:17:29.640 --> 0:17:33.560 in lucrative stem fields. This is science, technology, engineering, and 0:17:33.640 --> 0:17:38.080 mathematics majors that are seen to provide long run wealth 0:17:38.160 --> 0:17:42.679 returns to students without those degrees. African Americans and Latino 0:17:42.720 --> 0:17:46.399 has made less money after affirmative action ends. The average 0:17:46.400 --> 0:17:50.080 Black and Latino university applicant loses about five percent of 0:17:50.119 --> 0:17:53.720 their wages. Bliemer looked at higher earners, people making about 0:17:53.760 --> 0:17:56.680 a hundred thousand dollars in California by their mid thirties. 0:17:56.960 --> 0:17:59.880 So let's put that into context. California in twenty four 0:18:00.040 --> 0:18:05.439 team had about twenty thousand high earning Black and Latino 0:18:05.440 --> 0:18:08.840 workers in the state around the ages of like thirty 0:18:08.960 --> 0:18:13.040 to thirty four. How would that number of workers change 0:18:13.359 --> 0:18:17.840 if affirmative action had stayed in place and so those 0:18:17.880 --> 0:18:20.080 thirty to thirty four year olds had access to more 0:18:20.119 --> 0:18:23.320 selective universities fifteen years ago when they went to college. 0:18:23.800 --> 0:18:27.480 The answer is roughly three or four percent. So about 0:18:27.640 --> 0:18:31.639 seven hundred or a thousand people working in California would 0:18:31.680 --> 0:18:34.399 have been high earning if they had access to these 0:18:34.400 --> 0:18:38.720 selective universities through affirmative action. So for African Americans and Latinos, 0:18:38.760 --> 0:18:43.520 affirmative action had worked, they got more better academic credentials 0:18:43.560 --> 0:18:48.000 and that translated into higher salaries. But what about other students. 0:18:48.880 --> 0:18:52.159 One of the common arguments against affirmative action is that 0:18:52.200 --> 0:18:54.479 it takes one of those slots away from someone quote 0:18:54.960 --> 0:18:59.640 more deserving. Bloomers looked at that too. If that argument 0:18:59.640 --> 0:19:02.440 was right, key theorized, then getting rid of affirmative action 0:19:02.520 --> 0:19:07.800 would make their outcomes better. It didn't. Where did the 0:19:07.840 --> 0:19:10.800 white and Asian students who would have gone to Berkeley? 0:19:10.840 --> 0:19:13.399 Where did they go? Instead? Most of them go to 0:19:13.560 --> 0:19:18.120 highly selective private universities of similar quality to UC Berkeley, 0:19:18.160 --> 0:19:20.480 and so as a result, when you follow those students along, 0:19:20.920 --> 0:19:24.920 providing them access to UC Berkeley actually gives them surprisingly 0:19:25.040 --> 0:19:30.200 little in terms of longer run wage outcomes. That brings 0:19:30.280 --> 0:19:35.160 us back to the wealth gap. What Bloomer's research suggests 0:19:35.280 --> 0:19:37.760 is that part of the reason that affirmative action measures 0:19:37.840 --> 0:19:41.080 don't harm white and Asian students is because they tend 0:19:41.119 --> 0:19:44.600 to have other options. The reason they have those other 0:19:44.640 --> 0:19:48.720 options is because they are, on average, coming from families 0:19:49.000 --> 0:19:52.479 with greater wealth to begin with. Black and Hispanic students, 0:19:52.520 --> 0:19:54.440 on the other hand, don't have as many of those 0:19:54.440 --> 0:19:59.520 resources that limits their options college wise. They don't again, 0:19:59.560 --> 0:20:13.320 on average, ridge have equal opportunities elsewhere. Right after Prop 0:20:13.359 --> 0:20:16.280 two O nine, past college enrollment for black students in 0:20:16.359 --> 0:20:20.520 California state schools dropped by about fifteen percent. Ever since, 0:20:20.720 --> 0:20:24.040 California legislators and advocates have been trying to overturn it 0:20:24.400 --> 0:20:27.360 or to find another way to strengthen affirmative action measures 0:20:27.359 --> 0:20:32.360 in the state. Colleges have continued to prioritize diversity, so overall, 0:20:32.400 --> 0:20:34.600 the number of black people getting four year degrees is 0:20:34.640 --> 0:20:37.639 still rising. But not as fast as it was, and 0:20:37.680 --> 0:20:41.520 it's never caught up to white people. Last year, as 0:20:41.560 --> 0:20:44.240 the pandemic swept across the US and the Black Lives 0:20:44.240 --> 0:20:47.800 Matter movement put civil rights front and center, California lawmakers 0:20:47.800 --> 0:20:53.480 tried again. Shirley Webber led that fight. The ballot initiative 0:20:53.800 --> 0:20:58.199 this time was called Prop sixteen. Okay, it's supposed been 0:20:58.240 --> 0:21:00.560 cheered by somebody else's voice. That usual false to me, 0:21:01.119 --> 0:21:04.159 and I just said, let's do it. You know, if 0:21:04.160 --> 0:21:06.840 we're gonna do it, let's do it. The language was clunky. 0:21:07.000 --> 0:21:09.399 It asked voters to repeal the amendment to the state 0:21:09.440 --> 0:21:13.800 constitution that prohibited discrimination or preferential treatment on the basis 0:21:13.840 --> 0:21:16.480 of race, but it had lots of support from across 0:21:16.520 --> 0:21:20.000 the left. The founders of b LM, the a c 0:21:20.160 --> 0:21:22.879 l U, and the California Teachers Union all lined up 0:21:22.920 --> 0:21:27.639 behind it, and lots of celebrities too. Here's Eva DuVernay, 0:21:27.680 --> 0:21:30.920 Tracy Ellis, Ross and Ray encouraging people to vote for 0:21:30.960 --> 0:21:33.960 a Prop six team and the fight to dismantle systemic 0:21:34.040 --> 0:21:37.520 racism is on the ballot in California. Voting yes on 0:21:37.560 --> 0:21:40.720 Prop sixteen is our chance to right the wrongs of 0:21:40.760 --> 0:21:45.320 the past. Voting yes on Prop sixteen is one way 0:21:45.359 --> 0:21:48.960 to prove that black lives matter. I'm voting yes on Prop. 0:21:49.080 --> 0:21:51.960 Sixteen because I wouldn't have gotten into college had it 0:21:52.040 --> 0:21:54.720 not been for affirmative action, which means I wouldn't have 0:21:54.760 --> 0:21:59.119 had the same access to opportunities and resources as my 0:21:59.200 --> 0:22:02.679 wife peers. Voters in California, one of the most liberal 0:22:02.720 --> 0:22:05.399 states in the US, went to the polls again on 0:22:05.480 --> 0:22:09.679 affirmative action. It was a really big election, and the 0:22:09.680 --> 0:22:13.200 state's progressive voters were excited either to boot out to 0:22:13.240 --> 0:22:15.840 Donald Trump or to cast a vote for the first 0:22:15.840 --> 0:22:19.679 woman of color as vice president following a summer of 0:22:19.720 --> 0:22:22.680 Black Lives Matter protests. If there were ever a time 0:22:22.720 --> 0:22:25.840 for affirmative action to come back, this would be it, 0:22:26.840 --> 0:22:35.080 and Prop sixteen lost of people voted against it. In 0:22:35.119 --> 0:22:38.600 nearly twenty five years since California ended affirmative action, the 0:22:38.680 --> 0:22:43.119 policies had gotten even less popular. Surely, Weber thinks that 0:22:43.200 --> 0:22:46.520 Prop sixteen made some people once again feel like they 0:22:46.600 --> 0:22:48.840 might be on the losing end of a deal. If 0:22:48.880 --> 0:22:51.800 I tell you that, you know we're looking at the universities, 0:22:52.040 --> 0:22:54.320 then you know there's only so many seats in the university, 0:22:55.800 --> 0:22:58.480 and will your kid get a seat? That's always a question. 0:22:58.800 --> 0:23:01.760 And so those who thought they had a certain advantage 0:23:01.920 --> 0:23:05.119 decided that it was too much to get, which is 0:23:05.160 --> 0:23:08.480 not uncommon too much to get, So, you know, it's 0:23:08.520 --> 0:23:12.040 one of the sad stories of the progressive California voting 0:23:12.080 --> 0:23:14.840 for affirmative actually equal opportunity and access was a little 0:23:14.840 --> 0:23:17.760 bit more people wanted to do, you know, a little 0:23:17.800 --> 0:23:20.760 bit more. It may have cost them something. So even 0:23:20.760 --> 0:23:23.920 if the advantage that white people might have overall is 0:23:24.000 --> 0:23:27.399 unfair to begin with or evolved out of centuries of unfairness, 0:23:27.960 --> 0:23:32.160 individuals don't see how that applies to them. Yeah, and 0:23:32.640 --> 0:23:35.880 that perception of unfairness might be really hard to overcome. 0:23:39.400 --> 0:23:42.200 The thing is, focusing on education might be the wrong 0:23:42.240 --> 0:23:45.359 way to think about closing the racial wealth gap. For 0:23:45.400 --> 0:23:48.800 a long time, economists and policymakers thought that closing the 0:23:48.920 --> 0:23:53.240 education gap would eventually close the wealth gap. Better education, 0:23:53.440 --> 0:23:59.399 better jobs, more money, and walla equality. But recently a 0:23:59.440 --> 0:24:01.879 pair of e anymous at the St. Louis Federal Reserve 0:24:01.960 --> 0:24:06.640 suggested closing the education gap wouldn't even be enough when 0:24:06.680 --> 0:24:10.160 you look at wealth across racial groups. So For example, 0:24:10.400 --> 0:24:13.919 just among people with college degrees or advanced degrees, there 0:24:13.920 --> 0:24:19.119 are still huge gaps. The FED research shows that white 0:24:19.119 --> 0:24:23.440 and Asian people on average basically benefit more from education 0:24:23.680 --> 0:24:27.360 than Black and Latino people do at every level of education. 0:24:27.680 --> 0:24:31.640 The wealth gap and the income gap persists. What's that work? 0:24:31.720 --> 0:24:35.119 They say, are factors that you can't really see, discrimination 0:24:35.320 --> 0:24:39.840 or other long term structural disadvantages. They might account for 0:24:39.880 --> 0:24:43.200 as much as seventy of the wealth gap for black families. 0:24:43.800 --> 0:24:47.199 What do they recommend instead, They don't really make recommendations, 0:24:47.520 --> 0:24:50.640 not in that paper. What they do say is that 0:24:50.760 --> 0:24:54.400 individual initiative or marginal policy changes might only chip away 0:24:54.440 --> 0:24:57.760 at the gap. To really make significant progress, we need 0:24:57.960 --> 0:25:03.040 quote more fundamental change general society. Maybe we should stop 0:25:03.119 --> 0:25:06.640 fighting or small policy changes and push for bigger, more 0:25:06.760 --> 0:25:13.000 radical things. Shirley Weber is doing just that. In October, 0:25:13.200 --> 0:25:16.639 California passed into law another piece of legislation she wrote, 0:25:16.960 --> 0:25:21.119 We'll just start here by signing this. With this signature, 0:25:21.359 --> 0:25:25.560 Governor Newsome made history, making California the first state in 0:25:25.640 --> 0:25:30.199 the country studying and developing proposals for potential reparations for 0:25:30.320 --> 0:25:34.160 African Americans. That bill is focused on on African Americans, 0:25:34.359 --> 0:25:37.040 not on equity and everybody else. You know, there's a 0:25:37.119 --> 0:25:39.160 there's an awful lot old to group of people who've 0:25:39.160 --> 0:25:42.280 been here four hundred years, came here before the Mayflower, 0:25:42.720 --> 0:25:46.919 and still are at the very bottom of opportunity. Um. So, 0:25:47.000 --> 0:25:51.640 whether it's manifests itself in reparations, whether it manifests itself 0:25:51.680 --> 0:25:54.960 an affirmative action, remains to be seen. So what does 0:25:55.040 --> 0:25:59.080 the bill say, They're going to study reparations. It's a 0:25:59.160 --> 0:26:02.240 first step, and for people really interested in leveling the 0:26:02.280 --> 0:26:13.199 playing field, so to speak, it's an important one. For 0:26:13.320 --> 0:26:16.399 much of the past fifty years, no one took the 0:26:16.400 --> 0:26:21.080 movement for reparations all that seriously, it's different now. There 0:26:21.119 --> 0:26:24.040