Are Affirmative Action Programs Still Needed?
One of the authors of Proposition 209, Professor Glynn Custred of California State University, Hayward, has indicated that discrimination is no longer a major problem (NBC News Dateline interview, January 23, 1996). If that is true, then affirmative action programs have been successful, and they have, to a point. Unfortunately, as several recent studies have documented, Custred’s impression is far from the reality of the situation. White males make up 30% of the American population, but they make up 80% of the tenured professors and an even higher percentage of members of Congress, corporate CEOs, school superintendents, and U.S. Presidents. President Clinton provided the following statistics in his July 19, 1995, address mentioned above: The unemployment rate for African Americans remains about twice that of whites. The Hispanic rate is still much higher. Women have narrowed the earnings gap, but still make only 72 percent as much as men do for comparable jobs. The average income for
