Affirmative action leads to majorities being robbed of opportunities they rightfully deserve.

"You have set up the problem perfectly. I agree to use it as framework for the debate - but with one exception. You have described the situation as if the Yirimnots who replaced the Yarimjots are complete idiots. I will assume that they also meet the basic qualifications needed to do the work, though they may be less suitable than the 18 Yarimjots. We are going to debate whether the Yarimjots who lost the opportunity 'rightfully deserved' the job in any sense. The inappropriateness (or otherwise) of the term 'rob' will follow automatically." Very well. The Yirimnots are not complete idiots, though; they simply had a poorer education, and were thus less prepared for the job. I agree that the difference in intelligence has been caused by social impact and a general average of poorer income and education in Yirimnots when compared to Yarimjots. "But why are they less advanced in first case? Usually it is because of some historic problems, but we will not go into details." General outline: The Yirimnots lived rurally on an island, until the Yarimjots arrived with their advanced technology, civilization, and disease, which ended up in a mostly-Yarimjot upper class, and a disease-stricken Yirimnot lower class. "While the origin is historic, the problem still exists. The bigger problem is - it is likely to propagate to future generations also. If capitalism (or any form of competition) is left unregulated - rich become richer and poor become poor. This is why corrective action is required." This is one of the greatest economic fallacies of all time: "The rich get richer and the poor get poorer." (http://en.wikipedia.org...) It only really applies to Monopoly, the game. From Thomas Sowell's Economic Facts and Fallacies, page 136: "Studies which follow specific individuals over a period of years must not be confused with statistics on incomes in society as a whole over a period of years, or even statistics on particular income brackets over a period of years. The crucial difference is that most people move from one income bracket to another as the years go on. That makes it completely misleading to say, for example, that 'people making minimum wage have waited ten long years of a raise,' because these are not the same people making the same wages for ten years, even when the minimum wage has not been changed in a decade. Far from being an enduring class, most Americans in the bottom 10 or 20 percent of income-earners are transients in those brackets-- as are people in other income brackets." And on page 139: "To say that the bottom 20 percent of households are 'falling further behind' those in upper income brackets-- as is often said in the media, in politics, and among the intelligentsia-- is not to say that any given flesh-and-blood individuals are falling further behind, since most of the people in the bottom 20 percent move ahead over time to rise into higher income brackets. Moreover, even when an abstract statistical category is falling behind other abstract statistical categories, that does not necessarily represent a declining real per capita income, even among those people transiently within that category." Basically, there are always the poor, and there are always the rich, but people will shift among these brackets many times within their lifetime, often reaching near the top right before retirement, and the poor get richer, and the rich retire. If you disagree, point out a source that affirms that the poor get poorer, and I will find whatever statistical trick it uses to back up its fallacy. Or, of course, you can drop the argument here. "Having discussed the causes of this disparity, let us come back to the issue at hand. We can now see that the more qualified candidates are not necessarily more deserving candidates. The Yirimnots, who were just behind them, are likely to be equally intelligent and more hardworking than them. This is because they have managed to compete with them and finish close while facing more adversity." More hardworking? You make the assumption that it was a close finish. However, it was only close due to the fact that the standard deviations are so high, and there were quite a few Yarimjots who worked harder than their peers, being the first ones selected by Catino, while the hardest-working Yirimnots barely getting ahead of some of the higher-up Yarimjots. However, the end result is this: Many Yarimjots are still more qualified for the job than many Yirimnots, and they would actually know what they are doing in the job. Without affirmative action, Yirimnots would still eventually catch up with the Yarimjots; it would just take longer, and be safer for the economy. And as Thomas Jefferson said, "Delay is preferable to error." "You have raised the issue of how much extra cost it means to the company. This is a separate issue, disconnected with this debate. Still, for a brief response - I think the response of the Catino executive is highly exaggerated. On other hand, the response itself is a very typical one. 'If we hire them - we will go bankrupt!'" Okay, so the Catino executive likes to exaggerate. However, affirmative action still results in the executive (a Yarimjot) being deprived of the desired opportunity of hiring the most qualified applicants to work for them, so it is indeed relevant to the debate. "I agree that this does mean some extra cost for the company. However, if the regulations are applied evenly across the industry, it will not mean any loss of competitiveness for any company. On other hand this extra cost is a direct investment into the development of the society. It is in everybody's long term interest, if the whole population is brought into the mainstream." Competition is not the only problem. If every automobile-manufacturing company in a society suddenly switches their highly qualified workers with less qualified workers who lack experience in the field, competition will remain the same, but the output of every single company will decline. Instead of every company putting out 300 cars per day, they only put out 200 cars per day, which could end up with severe cuts in profit, and thus job cuts. It would also hurt consumers, as there would be a smaller supply of cars to buy. These numbers may be exaggerated, but the point remains the same: replacing a qualified workforce with one that is not will lead to a cut in output and profit, and a shortage of product for consumers. "There is just one small issue left, and I think it is important that we address it. What I said makes sense statistically - but what happens to the Yarimjots who got fired (or as it is more usual - were not selected - I think affirmative action requirements are usually known beforehand). This is a painful issue. But as I said earlier, someone is going to face this problem as long as demand for job is more than supply. Still Catino Industries is unlikely to be the end of the road. Indeed, these more qualified and more aware Yarimjots are likely to be better off than those Yirimnots who would have lost the opportunity in absence of affirmative action." True, but Catino Industries is not the only company forced to practice affirmative action. The same Yarimjots could repeatedly suffer to the hands of affirmative action by watching every job they try to obtain get filled in by a less-qualified Yirimnot. Eventually, many Yarimjots end up with the jobs that Yirimnots were usually filling, so it ended up in Yarimjots taking poor-paying jobs that they are overqualified for, and Yirimnots taking high-paying jobs that they are under-qualified for. See the problem? Qualifications are supposed to decide income. "I enjoyed your anagrams. But do Catino and Reamviatiff have any special significance?" Reamviatiff is an anagram for affirmative. Catino is an anagram for action. Thanks.