Pros and Cons of Affirmative Action

Analytical Paper 3 – Affirmative Action

Introduction

According to Raymond A. Noe, affirmative action is an organization’s active effort to find opportunities to hire or promote people in a particular group (Fundamentals of Human Resource Management 68). There are various arguments for and against affirmative action. Some believe that it gives certain groups of people an equal opportunity to find employment where they would otherwise be kicked under the rug. Others believe that even though it creates an opportunity for minority groups, the issue of reverse discrimination comes into play where once predominantly white male jobs offerings go to women and minority groups instead. The topic of affirmative action remains very controversial and highly questionable policy for employers. In my own honest opinion, affirmative action seems to be a “cop out” that was placed to make amends for the horrible treatment of Native Americans, African Americans and other minorities by white Americans for the past two hundred plus years.

Brief Analysis

In order to prevent discrimination in the workplace, most employers will use affirmative action programs or quotas in order to balance the order of minorities amongst the workforce. Sometimes, federal law demands certain employers to uphold affirmative action policies. Executive Order 11246 under the Lyndon B. Johnson presidency demands the use of affirmative action by federal contractors and subcontractors if their workforce met a predefined minimum size requirement and they have received more than $10,000 a year from the federal government. In order to take such affirmative action, it is necessary for HR to take the labor market proportion of employees who are members of various protected groups (...

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... utilization review rather than the traditional merit based system.

Conclusion

Affirmative action presents its fair share of pros and cons. Its original intention at seems to have a positive effect on society. However, when delving into the finer details of the implementation of affirmative action policies, it begins to expose the flaws within the system. In order to create an orderly, equally represented society, skin color, ethnicity, nationality and other dominating appearance factors have to exit the equation entirely. Not to say that we should not embrace our culture, but if the requested information is not a bona fide occupational qualification, then it should not be considered in the hiring/admissions process.

Works Cited

Noe, Raymond A., et al. Fundamentals of Human Resource Management. 5th. New York: McGraw-Hill/Irwin, 2014. Print. 27 March 2014.