I've been somewhat hesitant to weigh in on the issue of affirmative action because I have mixed feelings about it. But I've been really disturbed by the talk from Kevin Drum and Ezra Klein about making affirmative action class-based.
I've supported the race-based variety in the past, but I feel very strongly that, from the point of view of the individual actor, it's highly problematic. That is, if we try to game which individual has an advantage or disadvantage in terms of opportunity, we quickly run into trouble. We can see that individuals are infinitely diverse - each of us has different talents and weaknesses, even before we take into account external things like race and income. The state is not in the business of trying to eliminate that basic diversity, nor should it be. And while it's possible in the agregate to correct for the external factors (race, income, parenting, education, health care, cultural exposure), to some extent that basic diversity of individuals will be rendered meaningless/impotent. For an issue like income inequality, this seems like an awfully extreme solution.
That said, I believe there's a much stronger argument for race-based affirmative action, and it has nothing to do with equalizing individual circumstances. The fact is, certain groups have been repeatedly abused by our society, and have in the process come to believe that they can't succeed within the same institutional structures that have oppressed them. (Obviously this has been true for African Americans in the past; whether it's still the case is what the Supreme Court is debating now.) But by pushing some individuals through the system, success stories are created, and the perception of these historically oppressed groups can change. It's only this much broader end - recasting the attitudes of a whole subculture - that can justify the gross inequalities affirmative action creates for individuals.
Yes, class and income inequality are serious problems, but there's no dearth of success stories for the working poor in America, and it's much harder to talk about a pattern of historical oppression. Besides, aren't there much more precise policies for dealing with the problems of poverity? In the realm of college admittance, for instance, we already have a huge superstructure of student loan programs, tax credits, and education subsidies. Certainly these policies could be improved, but affirmative action's significant drawbacks make it inappropriate.
By the way, it's very possible that in other countries - I'm thinking India, or even Britain, where class plays a much bigger role than it does for Americans - class-based affirmative action might make some sense.
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