The current system of preference programs in admissions to the state's universities, in contracting, and in civil service means one person gets help at the expense of another. This is a zero sum game. At its heart, this issue is a question of fairness. Preference programs today are not about making up for past wrongs, but are based on the goal of gender and racial parity. It is an impossible goal.
Representational goals are ultimately unattainable.
They create incentives for groups to capitalize on differences, instead of working towards commonalities. Fairness in this country, as defined by its original national ideals, is about equality of opportunity, equally protected under the law. That the United States has never fully lived up to the principle of universal equality is no reason to willfully violate it today. The irony of today's affirmative action programs, which grant preferences on the basis of race and sex, is that the solution perpetuates the very problem it was intended to solve. Last summer, the Pacific Research Institute released a study by policy fellow Michael Lynch that analyzed admission policies to the University of California's medical schools.