Assignment 11 – Race, Racism and Work
In today’s world, the words racism, discrimination and inequality have a direct impact in our daily lives. We see it every day in the media, in education and even in the workforce. Racism and discrimination take on various shapes and form in the realm of work. While we have studied many arguments that have shown the differences of wage and work in our modern society, this week’s readings take us to another level of inequality which has contributed to the prevention of upward mobility for specific groups of people today. These articles talk about the impact of racism and discrimination in the realm of work and how the inequality creates a disadvantage to people of color living in the U.S. today.
In the article by Pager and Sheppard, they begin to unravel the complexity of racial discrimination in the realm of wealth through employment, housing and finance markets as well as provide a system of measurement to see the disparity in each. Through some case studies, the article also presents the different types of discrimination that are embedded in each area of wealth. The article defines the idea of individual, organizational and structural discrimination that are embedded in the four areas of wealth discussed in the article. The authors provide hard data that give the overall impact of how discrimination can influence people of color today.
The other article, “The Roots of the Widening Racial Wealth Gap…” takes a focused look into wealth inequality today between whites and blacks as well as the factors that contribute to it. The authors argue that elements such as home ownership, income levels, education and accessibility to economic gain directly impact wealth between whites and blacks. The article also argues how these inequalities are created by a combination of individual-cultural choices and institutional policies and practices pre-and post-Civil Rights movement. The studies in the article show how the inequality in the areas of gaining wealth create disadvantages and unequal opportunities for people of color today.
Throughout our semester, the element of inequality has lingered in many ways. We have seen how the relationships between workers and employers affect production and entertain different perspectives of how work should be handled. We discussed how the philosophy of earning wages can be seen differently between worker and employer. Even in our discussion on the idea of capitalism and how the “true spirit of capitalism” might be in some but not all. Point is, inequality exists in many of these arguments but when we see that some of these in-differences are embedded in exposing people’s race, religion, sexual orientation and color of their skin, it is hard to form a constructive argument. The marginalization of people because of race and discrimination is founded in the realm of hate. No constructive argument can be formed when hate is a factor. What these articles did do well was exposed the tangible evidence and possible solutions to combat the inequalities in wealth and work. But to begin to address the issues of race and discrimination, hate must be conquered among people today. It must begin with people themselves.
