I am a white guy and should be relieved to know that the deck is still stacked in my favor. Instead, I am outraged at some of the things that are going on in this country.
For the longest time, I was against “Affirmative Action.” I had always heard the arguments against it and they seemed to make sense. For example, if a university has an affirmative action program, then at least in theory, there could be a situation where a white person is denied admission to that school because they had to make space for someone who fell under a “quota” group.
I had to ask myself here recently, “How many of these victims of Affirmative Action have you ever met?” The answer is pretty simple: none. I have never heard of anyone who was denied admission, at least at Oklahoma State, because they had to give up their spot to someone who isn’t Caucasian.
So, I did some digging concerning how much people actually earn on the job. You would figure that the numbers would clear up this whole mess. After all, we did get rid of segregation 40 years ago, didn’t we? We are the land of the free and the home of the brave, aren’t we? The preamble of the constitution says it like this:
“We the people of the United States, in order to form a more perfect union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.”
So, I found the following numbers at www.census.gov. It was very shocking to me. This information is somewhat dated, as it reflects income in 2001. According to their numbers, the average male in the United States made $40,136, and the average female made $30,420. This is ridiculous.
The statistics get even worse. In 1991, white males made an average of $40,790 and white females made an average of $30,849. If you notice, these are a little bit higher than the average population. The average African-American male made $31,921 and the average African-American female made $27,297. The average Hispanic male made $25,271, and the average female Hispanic made $21,973.
Don’t you think there is something wrong with this situation? The bottom line is something has to be done about this. I do know that Affirmative Action has helped some people, but we can do more. We can give to different organizations such as the United Negro College Fund.
The other thing that must be done is to insist for “equal pay for equal work.” There is no legitimate reason that anyone should get paid less just because they have a different color of skin, or they are female. The only reason the “glass ceiling” exists is because we allow it to exist. It’s time to break it with a sledgehammer.
Why should a guy like me care about fair wages? It’s very simple: it’s the right thing to do.
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