Affirmative Action

Essay by chamiflyUniversity, Bachelor'sA, April 2004

download word file, 9 pages 3.4 2 reviews

What is resisted more by white males then by women and minorities because it is perceived to work against their own self-interest? Affirmative Action. The history of affirmative action has its roots in the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Title VII of the Civil Rights Act provided the initial legal basis for affirmative action for women and minorities in the workplace. Affirmative action is an intervention that is aimed at giving management a chance to correct an injustice, a mistake, or outright discrimination. Affirmative action is a policy to encourage equal opportunity and to level the playing field for groups of people who have been and are discriminated against. According to the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, affirmative action, "Is considered essential to assuring that jobs are genuinely and equally accessible to qualified persons, without regard to their sex, racial, or ethnic characteristics."

Over the past few decades' roles for women and minorities in the workplace have increased.

Many of the predominately male occupations have increasingly become more diverse. Affirmative action helps to promote diversity in employment and equality between gender and race. The effectiveness of affirmative action and Equal Employment Opportunity legislation has been debated for years, with advocates citing gains made by

Carter 2

women and minorities in pay, organizational representation, and organizational status. Women, in general, have been the main beneficiaries of affirmative action and will be the biggest losers if it is overturned. The number of women entering the professions, including medicine, law and accounting, has increased substantially in 30 years. Women of all races have increased their share of professional positions in corporations. However, women have yet to achieve equality in the workplace as the gap in wages continues. Nationally, women earn 76 cents for every dollar earned by men. A National Academy of Science...