The Atlantic - Latest Comments in SCOTUS Rules For Ricci

Re: SCOTUS Rules For Ricci

Fred Moolten — Wed, 01 Jul 2009 12:05:35 -0000

I'm impressed by both the fairness and civility of much of the above discussion. My own view is that given the practical constraints involved, the Court made the right decision. Its impact is to ensure that problems about testing should be thought through before the test is designed rather than after the results are in, which makes sense to most people, particularly because most of us respond with a visceral sense of unfairness when those who passed a test are denied the promised benefits.

I'll add one further point that has probably not yet been made (although I may have missed it). As has been pointed out, the test included many items critical to split-second, life and death decisions that a fire captain must make to ensure the safety of building occupants and firefighters. These included the way a fire spreads, the appropriate means to contain it, and many other principles that must become second nature during an urgent situation. It is therefore important to realize that these principles were part of the study materials provided to the firefighters in advance of testing. Under those circumstances, failure to reproduce them under test conditions might not have been an unreasonable means of concluding that the same individuals might have failed to employ those principles during an actual fire, with potentially disastrous consequences.

Re: SCOTUS Rules For Ricci

Jennifer D. — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 11:57:03 -0000

Alas, the equal results never happened, and the skew that employers and college admissions exercised in order to achieve increasing levels of diversity became so egregious that whites finally complained and demanded that the laws be applied equally. Definitely a case of unintended consequences, and one that routinely sets most affirmative action fans to squawking.

Equal results "never" happened? Whites "finally" complained? Let's say whites just started complaining today. That would have given AA initiatives about 30-35 years to work, following generation, after generation, after generation of not just discrimination, but Jim Crow and slavery. But, in fact, some whites have been fighting against these policies since the very beginning. In the San Francisco firefighter affirmative action case I mentioned above, the case took ten years to resolve, meaning changes did not really begin to take affect until the late 1980s.

How long do you think it should take to arrive at some fairness considering the history of this country? Does 20 or 30 years seem like long enough? It does not to me.

Re: SCOTUS Rules For Ricci

Cal — Mon, 29 Jun 2009 22:35:01 -0000

Stereotype threat does not explain the test score gap. To the extent that stereotype threat exists, it exacerbates the existing gap.

As with legacy admissions in universities, until people are willing to mount wholesale attacks on that process, they can miss me with their weak complaints about wanting a "colorblind" process.

Working and middle class whites and Asians are by far the most disadvantaged by the current college admissions process. Both groups would cheerfully accept an end to legacy admits if it accompanied an end to affirmative action. So be careful what you offer.

More importantly -- and almost certainly in order to make Title IX more palatable politically -- the law is interpreted to protect both minorities and whites.

I agree, but one key point: the law wasn't written to protect both minorities and whites. At the time these laws were written, everyone assumed that a generation of boosting would end all disparities--that is, equal opportunity would lead to equal results. It was assumed at the time that the only protection needed would be overt discrimination against blacks (Asians and Hispanics weren't in the original equation).

Alas, the equal results never happened, and the skew that employers and college admissions exercised in order to achieve increasing levels of diversity became so egregious that whites finally complained and demanded that the laws be applied equally. Definitely a case of unintended consequences, and one that routinely sets most affirmative action fans to squawking.

I think Scalia's opinion was the interesting one--at what point will the Supreme Court be forced to face the constitutional issues involved when disparate impact clashes with equal protection?

Re: SCOTUS Rules For Ricci

Jennifer D. — Mon, 29 Jun 2009 22:32:18 -0000

Oh yes, thanks. I forgot the wonderful word "some" in front of Americans.

Re: SCOTUS Rules For Ricci

BobP — Mon, 29 Jun 2009 20:11:38 -0000

I need to read the opinions again, more carefully, but suspect that will confirm my thoughts that the roots of the problem lie in the political process of 40+ years ago.

Yes, disparate impact is part of the law, but so is disparate treatment. More importantly -- and almost certainly in order to make Title IX more palatable politically -- the law is interpreted to protect both minorities and whites.

Hence the problem which, despite comments about "clear precedent," has not previously been addressed to my knowledge (at least not based on the district court opinion, which I did read thoroughly): what do you do in a situation when either action you take potentially violates the law, only with respect to a different group of employees? When there is disparate impact but before there's a showing of an acceptable alternative that meets business requirements and has less disparate impact?

Deny promotions? Disparate treatment of the white firefighters, and it was disingenuous of the lower court to pretent it wasn't, just because no one got promoted. You set up a process and criteria; if that had resulted in all minority firefighters being promoted, it would have been accepted; but when it resulted in all white firefighers being promoted, it was not. The white firefighters were treated differently than minority firefighters in the same situation would have been, and we all know it.

Accept the results and promote the white firefighters? Disparate impact of the minority firefighters. That's not necessarily a violation of the law, of course, UNLESS the minority firefighters can show an acceptable alternative that meets business requirements and also would have had less disparate impact. But if there is an acceptable alternative, yes, disparate impact is also a violation of the law.

How do you balance the rights of ALL parties? How do you protect the rights of one side without violating the rights of the other side? Perhaps it would work if the city, rather than just throwing out the results, made a strong, good-faith effort to identify an acceptable alternative. (Of course, it would have been best to do that BEFORE using the test.) If and only if the city can make a reasonably clear case for an acceptable alternative, THEN toss out the results of the first test -- but don't do it just because you think you might lose a lawsuit. The POSSIBILITY of losing a lawsuit means that there MIGHT be a better alternative. Should that be enough to justify disparate treatment of the white firefighters? Or should the city have to demonstrate a greater probability of losing -- or even that there clearly was a better alternative? Or to put it another way, does the city have an obligation to defend its test, until there's more proof of a better alternative, rather than just concede the disparate impact issue? Can you engage in disparate treatment of one group without more support for the disparate impact claim?

(If they had done that at the time, and come up with the better alternative, and THEN threw out the results of the test, they would have been on much stronger ground. There may well be better alternatives, but it surely looks like the city didn't really investigate until long after they threw out the results and denied promotions.)

I think that's where the court is, right now; trying to find an acceptable solution that doesn't overly disadvantage either side, and therefore fits within the political compromise of discrimination law. At least in theory, putting the city to the trouble of a good-faith attempt to identify a better alternative before it accepts the disparate impact to the white firefighters.

Did they get it right in this particular case? Maybe, maybe not. Is there a better solution to the conflict between the protections granted to both sides? Perhaps.

Maybe the law should say that intentional discrimination against the white/young/male/native-born/JudeoChristian/etc. is acceptable to avoid disparate impact of minority/old/female/foreign-born/Muslim/etc., even before there is evidence of a better alternative test with less disparate impact. That is, maybe disparate impact by itself should be enough and maybe when there is a conflict between the two sides, you should put a thumb on the scale in favor of the historically disadvantaged.

There are certainly reasonable arguments to be made for such a reworking of the law. But that's not the compromise Congress -- or the American people -- agreed to.

Re: SCOTUS Rules For Ricci

DaveinHackensack — Mon, 29 Jun 2009 19:18:05 -0000

If the results of this intervention are actually replicable, then maybe they'll do something similar before firefighter exams.

Re: SCOTUS Rules For Ricci

WoofWoof — Mon, 29 Jun 2009 19:01:27 -0000

this is coming from someone who thought that the Ricci guys who scored highest should get to keep their promotions in this case. I just think they need to research what happened and design a better test for next time.

That's why judges get the big money :-) I mean, that's easy to say, but legally the test results are either discriminatory or they aren't. You can't really rule "ok this time, but just this once" (except for Bush v. Gore of course). Either the disparate impact test is valid or it isn't.

In practice, I agree with you. New Haven seems to be acting in good faith, this stuff is tough, they're going to make mistakes, they should just try to do better next time. But I think everyone's attempt to put this case into a little corner and treat it as an exception isn't right. The disparate impact test directly leads to situations like this; people should be honest about what they really think disparate impact means and what you can deduce from it (not just in a legal sense, but in general).

always amazed by the short memory of Americans.

I hope you're from the US. Otherwise, posting a huge generalization like this, especially after the wide variety of viewpoints you see in these comments, is pretty rude.

Re: SCOTUS Rules For Ricci

DaveinHackensack — Mon, 29 Jun 2009 18:45:36 -0000

Socgrad,

I'm going to use block quotes to quote parts of what you wrote and respond to them below, but I will be quoting your words as is.

I didn't say, even imply, that I think the sole reason for the racial gap in standardized tests is due to stereotype threat.

Fair enough. But what causes the gaps is less relevant to this case than that the gaps have proved to be fairly intractable over the years. That means that, unless you have a silver bullet to change that (perhaps that intervention Jennifer D. mentions above is such a silver bullet, but I'm skeptical), then you have to deal with a world in which there will be similar gaps on job-related tests. That means, firstly, not assuming that any such gaps are implicitly the result of biased test-writing.

I do understand the difference between low average scores for a group coexisting with high scores for some individuals within that group (graduate training remember).

I assumed you understood initially (I figured I was clear enough in using words such as "average" and "tend"), but then you did very well on standardized tests, were in gifted & talented programs growing up, and had a Ph.D., and were a black woman. There are two reasons I could think of why you might have mentioned that: as an attempted refutation of my point about the average group differences on standardized tests, or as an appeal to authority (i.e., I'm smart; therefore, what I say should be given more weight). I explicated the point about individual variation within groups on the chance you might have mentioned your credentials as an attempt at refutation.

I do also understand that *never* in our country's history have society, media, or politicians made that distinction.

Please. Society, the media, politicians, and voters make that distinction all the time today. It's 2009. That's how no one on Merrill Lynch's board questioned Stan O'Neal's intellect when they made him CEO of the company*; same with Ken Chenault at American Express, Don Parsons at Time Warner, Ron Williams at Aetna, etc. That's how the voters in a mostly white state elected Deval Patrick governor, and how the voters in a mostly white country elected Barack Obama president; etc. Similarly, who in the media questions Neil Degrasse Tyson's intellect? If anything, the media goes out of its way to portray African Americans, in particular, in a positive light. Think of how often black nuclear families appear in advertisements, when such families comprise a minority of African American families in real life. Think of how often African Americans are portrayed as judges, scientists, etc. in fictional portrayals. Think of how infrequently blacks are portrayed as criminals in a show such as Law & Order.

Lastly, your idea of quotas as a way of balancing the desire for diversity with the need for "the best qualified candidate" assumes that you won't ever encounter a situation where the objectively "best qualified candidate" is a minority rather than a white person.

No it doesn't. It assumes that when you are dealing with groups (e.g., a group of firefighters taking a test), it's unlikely that blacks will be represented among the top scorers in proportion to their share of the population. Although it didn't happen in New Haven, it's certainly not impossible for the highest scorer on a similar test to be black.

In your proposal, the best qualified candidate from the black pool is the best qualified *black* candidate, not the best qualified candidate.

That's true, and that's an inevitable downside of quotas.

The white candidate will always be considered the "best qualified candidate".

You assume that a white candidate will always score the highest on the test. Why? Asian-Americans routinely outscore whites on standardized tests.

Screw that, direct competition, with serious legal enforcement of anti-discrimination laws and a real committment to ending economic disparities in K-12 education is the way to ensure diversity *and* merit in employment.

We already have more than serious legal enforcement of anti-discrimination laws -- we have the presumption of guilt of any employer when non-Asian minority candidates under perform on job-related tests. And as for ending economic disparities in K-12 education, look up the history of the Abbott Decision in my home state of NJ. We spend more per student in poor, minority districts in New Jersey than the state average, and we've been doing this for two decades. This hasn't done much to ameliorate racial gaps in test scores.

*No, he is not the CEO now.

Re: SCOTUS Rules For Ricci

Juba — Mon, 29 Jun 2009 18:28:36 -0000

The fire department sure wasn't color blind 30, 40 years ago. (Hell, 20 years ago.)

Indeed. The Fire and Police Depts were once dominated by White ethnics like the Irish (famously) many decades ago, when patronage systems were the order of the day in major urban cities. They understood it as looking out for their own in a world where everyone else is doing the same.

There's still an advantage to be had which is rooted in those old ways; when you look at families that have generations of cops or firefighters, naturally you have to factor in a pipeline in which fathers use their personal connections from decades of service to keep those jobs in the family.

As with legacy admissions in universities, until people are willing to mount wholesale attacks on that process, they can miss me with their weak complaints about wanting a "colorblind" process.

Re: SCOTUS Rules For Ricci

Juba — Mon, 29 Jun 2009 18:18:11 -0000

Im a big fan of multiple intelligence theory. Thanks for the plug.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multiple_intelligence_theory#Gardner.27s_categories_of_intelligence

Re: SCOTUS Rules For Ricci

Jennifer D. — Mon, 29 Jun 2009 18:10:32 -0000

That should be: always amazed by the short memory of Americans.

Re: SCOTUS Rules For Ricci

Jennifer D. — Mon, 29 Jun 2009 18:09:19 -0000

Regarding the issue of being "color blind" in hiring decisions, whenever I hear this kind of talk in a discussion about Affirmative Action, it rankles. The fire department sure wasn't color blind 30, 40 years ago. (Hell, 20 years ago.)

How do we think we got to the point in our history now where blacks can even consider applying for a supervisory job at the fire department? People died, and people fought their asses off and sued, that's how.

This stuff doesn't magically happen: one day in 1974 in San Francisco there are only 4 black firefighters (that's a true number) because of blatant racism, and then the next day (or rather, ten years later after intense litigation) they declare "okay, now we're color blind" and from then on the department magically transforms to a more fair representation, i.e., not 90% white and male.

The issue is murky, yes, and the solutions to arrive at fairness are not always obvious, but I am always at the short memory of Americans when it comes to Affirmative Action.

By the way, this is coming from someone who thought that the Ricci guys who scored highest should get to keep their promotions in this case. I just think they need to research what happened and design a better test for next time.

Re: SCOTUS Rules For Ricci

Jennifer D. — Mon, 29 Jun 2009 17:26:28 -0000

Dave,

Well, a first step would be education about the concept, so that people would not think it was "ridiculous and offensive" as Ninja put it.

And, okay, I know it's just Wikipedia, here's what they have to say about tested solutions. They only speak about African Americans here, but I'm sure the same could be applied to girls, and let's say, engineering tests, for instance. I have no idea if these solutions really would work, or what percentage of scores it would truly affect. But, it seems fair to me to at least explore stereotype threat as a possible factor in test scores:

The theory has generated a good deal of intervention work, some of which has boosted the achievement and test scores of low performing minority students.[19][9] Since stereotype threat appears to be one of the key contributing factors to the gaps in test scores, researchers Geoffrey L. Cohen, Julio Garcia, Nancy Apfel, and Allison Master proposed intervention methods to address the problem in 2006. The intervention, a brief in-class writing assignment, significantly improved the grades of African American students and reduced the racial achievement gap by 40%. These results suggest that the racial achievement gap, a major social concern in the United States, could be ameliorated by the use of timely and targeted social-psychological interventions.

Re: SCOTUS Rules For Ricci

Jennifer D. — Mon, 29 Jun 2009 16:59:33 -0000

Great post. You are much more qualified to take on DaveinHackensack than I was in the last post about this subject!

Re: SCOTUS Rules For Ricci

The Ninja Zombie — Mon, 29 Jun 2009 16:09:20 -0000

Regarding colorblindness, it seems quite desirable here. Fire is colorblind, so an optimal decision procedure must also be.

If it's a good test (which is in dispute up the thread) then it might be a necessary component of figuring out whether the applicant has the desired capacity, but it would not be sufficient.

Indeed, it may not be the best possible measurement. But it is the best presently available measurement. All your objections are valid. All measurements are noisy. One may be able to construct better firefighting tests.

However, until you actually have that better test, you have no reason to discard this one. It's imperfect, but it's better than nothing. If you play a poker variant where you see 2 of your opponent's cards, you don't ignore that info just because you can't see the other 3 cards. You accept your uncertainty and make the best guess possible. You don't ignore the info you have, and make a guess based on irrelevant criteria.

Regarding objectivity: objectivity of a test simply means that the scoring of it is unrelated to the subjective opinions and perceptions of the grader. Any multiple choice test, for example, meets this criteria. A test need not be accurate to be objective.

As for fairness and objectivity, I definitely disagree with you here. If an exam is not objective, then the outcome will change depending on the subjective opinions of the grader. So is a subjective exam fair regardless of who's subjective opinions influence it? Or are only a certain set of people capable of giving a subjective fair exam? If so, which people?

Re: SCOTUS Rules For Ricci

deva — Mon, 29 Jun 2009 15:35:37 -0000

NinjaZombie, you're right. I misspoke. Colorblindness, in the literal sense of "having no knowledge of the color of applicants" is attainable, but it's not desirable because the "colorblindness" in this sense ignores the social reality that there ain't no such thing in our lived experiences, the experiences that create the social conditions for our life chances (See Ginsburgs dissent for a more eloquent exegesis of the reasons why than I could possibly muster).

In terms of "minimize # of fire related death" as an objective standard, I think you illustrate the point. First, minimize the number of fire related deaths is a retrospective or purely theoretical question. Applicants can not be objectively shown to minimize the number of fire related deaths prospectively. What one can measure is their capacity to minimize the # of fire related deaths. The question then is: what are the best measured of such a capacity? Does this written test attempt to measure whether candidates have the firefighting acumen to adapt to fast-paced, high risk situations or does it measure whether they have a basic understanding of the physics of fire? Does it attempt to do both? The truth is the ability to minimize the # of fire related death is probably constituted by both these things. A writen test can likely only show mastery of the later. If it's a good test (which is in dispute up the thread) then it might be a necessary component of figuring out whether the applicant has the desired capacity, but it would not be sufficient.

In the end, 'm not really arguing about whether the test is good or not. I don't know and apparently, the state never even attempted to find out, but I am making a larger argument about how we've talked ourselves into thinking that everything can be made objective and the further fiction that only those things which are objective are fair. I would argue that's simply not the case. Fairness is an essential criterion, but it's not always easily determined especially when dealing with social issues.

Re: SCOTUS Rules For Ricci

socgrad — Mon, 29 Jun 2009 15:26:47 -0000

The fact that you had to google stereotype threat because you knew nothing about it beforehand demonstrates that you need to do a *lot* more reading and research on racial disparities in testing (and race relations in America) before mocking my comment.

As for the mocking, if you act like a snotty two year old, you'll get treated like one, with me essentially ignoring you.

Notice I did reply to Dave, he actually had substantive things to say in his reply.

Re: SCOTUS Rules For Ricci

Jingo Killah — Mon, 29 Jun 2009 15:26:03 -0000

Bitten on the ass by my own snark. And it's funny how one gets the most response when one frames an argument poorly.

I don't know the nature of this test in particular, I'm just an advocate for more authentic assessment in all cases. I don't disagree that science, math, and vocabulary play a role, it's just that I was assuming that it was over-weighted, as it is in most educational assessment. You test what you can test, and it's easier to frame a collapsing building as an algebra problem than as a complex, multi-layered judgment call. I'm not invalidating the algebra, more saying that the emphasis on this one way of knowing can come at the expense of other ways of knowing.

Anyway, I agree that a fair assessment would include a written component in addition to several types of performance assessment, virtualization and modeling tests, and administrative skills assessment. This is closer to what I meant, though it lacks the snark I love so well.

BreakerBaker:

But this case was never about whether or not the city should use a test. It was about whether or not and why the city should be able to cast out a test (and all scheduled promotions) based solely on the unforeseen results of the test.

good point, I bow

Re: SCOTUS Rules For Ricci

socgrad — Mon, 29 Jun 2009 15:17:52 -0000

@ DaveinHackensack:

I was wrong to assume that you were making invidious commments about black people in your post. You may in fact be that rare soul who can look at the results of multiple standardized merit tests that rank average black scores as the lowest of all racial groups and *not* conclude that black people as a group are intellectually inferior.

I didn't say, even imply, that I think the sole reason for the racial gap in standardized tests is due to stereotype threat. What I said is that stereotype threat is a real phenomenon, it does affect minorities' and women's scores on standardized tests, and that being regularly told by people that your group (on average) always scores the lowest on standardized tests is one of the things that causes steretype threat.

I do understand the difference between low average scores for a group coexisting with high scores for some individuals within that group (graduate training remember). I do also understand that *never* in our country's history have society, media, or politicians made that distinction. Accepting the *truth* of consistently lower average scores for black people on standardized merit / ability tests (especially when the race-neutrality of those tests is still in question) *will* translate into a mainstream acceptance of the idea of *all* black people being inherently inferior. Every black person, regardless of their actual ability will be assumed to be less capable, less competent, and less qualified than the white person next to them, regardless of that white persons' actual ability. Sound familiar? Aren't we as a society still trying to crawl out from under this particular rock?

Lastly, your idea of quotas as a way of balancing the desire for diversity with the need for "the best qualified candidate" assumes that you won't ever encounter a situation where the objectively "best qualified candidate" is a minority rather than a white person. In your proposal, the best qualified candidate from the black pool is the best qualified *black* candidate, not the best qualified candidate. The white candidate will always be considered the "best qualified candidate". The other candidates will be "the best from X minority group" with the implicit assumption that these minority groups are not (and can't be) as qualified as the white group.

Screw that, direct competition, with serious legal enforcement of anti-discrimination laws and a real committment to ending economic disparities in K-12 education is the way to ensure diversity *and* merit in employment.

Re: SCOTUS Rules For Ricci

BreakerBaker — Mon, 29 Jun 2009 15:14:30 -0000

"Once they issued that test with those criteria, they were set up for failure."

Only if they weren't prepared to stand behind the tests regardless of what the results were. In the end, the main failure was wanting a particular result.

Re: SCOTUS Rules For Ricci

The Ninja Zombie — Mon, 29 Jun 2009 14:53:23 -0000

Socgrad, I didn't cut and paste your comment. I completely

rewrote it, preserving the main point but rewording, with the primary goal of mocking your post.

As for stereotype threat, I googled it, and it sounds ridiculous and offensive to me. Are minorities/white women so fragile that hearing viewpoints they disagree with/dislike causes them to perform poorly? I'm not saying it's wrong (I don't know enough about it), but I do find it surprising.

Incidentally, I skimmed this thread. I did not observe anyone refuting Dave's point. In this thread, he only has one reply (yours) which explicitly does not even attempt to address his point.

I skimmed the previous Ricci thread, but saw no refutation there either. Could you point out a comment I missed? Also curious, which of Dave's facts were refuted? Was it the point about racial differences in most test scores, or is it the point about the EEOC's 4/5th rule?

Re: SCOTUS Rules For Ricci

BreakerBaker — Mon, 29 Jun 2009 14:52:17 -0000

I generally agree with a lot of what you're saying, but the implication that racial/ethnic/cultural background or gender should be viewed as meritous seems to me to be a pretty dubious one.

While you're right that merit is not something that can plausibly be gauged solely through objective means, I'm at a loss to determine why it is more unseemly to determine who is and is not worthy of promotion based on the results of a multi-tier process that is gender and color blind than it is to multi-tier process if the results can be trumped to serve gender or racial quotas.

Mind you, I am not talking about hiring or college admittance procedures.

Re: SCOTUS Rules For Ricci

hrf — Mon, 29 Jun 2009 14:47:35 -0000

"We didn't want to get sued" is probably more about not getting sued than it is about appearances per se.

I don't doubt that they tossed the test because they didn't want to get sued. And I'm not unsympathetic to them not wanting to get sued. But I think that motivation, frankly, is a terrible primary one. Some self-reflection on whether the initial test and criteria were reasonable to begin with would be nice. Otherwise, it's all about self-preservation.

In that sense, the city can't win.

True. It's a Catch-22, but largely one of their own making. Once they issued that test with those criteria, they were set up for failure.

Re: SCOTUS Rules For Ricci

DaveinHackensack — Mon, 29 Jun 2009 14:40:16 -0000

Socgrad,

See my question above about stereotype threat. Assume that is responsible for the average performance differences between different groups on all rigorous standardized tests. What then? What is your solution? I suggested a solution above. I'm interested in hearing yours.

Re: SCOTUS Rules For Ricci

DaveinHackensack — Mon, 29 Jun 2009 14:33:21 -0000

Socgrad,

I haven't made any gratuitously invidious comments here, so I'm not sure why you feel the need to claim that my "larger point" is to put down black people. Give that a rest.

The reason I brought up the performance differences on other standardized tests is because they are directly relevant to this case. On academic standardized tests (such as the ones you regularly score at the high end of) or on the military's vocational test, no one presumes bias when there are differences in average performance by race or ethnic group, and yet they do presume bias on non-military, job-related standardized tests. Do you think this is logically consistent? If so, why?

As for your point about stereotype threat, let's assume that you are correct and the reason why Latinos and African Americans (read: Latinos and African Americans, not "black people"), on average*, tend to under-perform other groups on standardized tests is because of that. What, then, would be your proposed solution? To scrap all rigorous objective tests entirely? Then you are left with subjective measures of merit in hiring, which opens the door to nepotism, cronyism, and racism in making hiring decisions.

As I've suggested elsewhere, the best balance between hiring the best-qualified workers and achieving the political goal of diversity in municipal hiring may simply be quotas: decide how many candidates you want from each ethnic group and then pick the best candidates from each group. That would be better than lowering standards for everyone. If you have a better solution, I'd love to hear it.

*To make explicit what I assumed was implicit by the phrase "on average": this doesn't mean that there aren't individuals in each group that score very well or very poorly on these tests; there are.