Preferential Opportunity

Veterans returning from WWII used their benefits to buy homes and get educated.  Owning your home was the first step in wealth-building, and the funded education guaranteed employment.  The result was an explosion of economic growth, the blossoming of suburban life, and the emergence of the American dream.

It only worked for white people.


We were trying to do well with the GI Bill, but our banks wouldn't lend to African-Americans.  Of the first 67,000 insured mortgages, less than 100 were issued to non-whites despite thousands having applied. 

In the years that followed, millions took advantage of the home loan guarantee. From 1944 to 1952, the Veterans Administration backed nearly 2.4 million home loans for World War II Veterans.  Blacks, with wages  39-52% lower than whites, were ineligible for or denied most opportunities.^(note)  

Suburban development areas often had formal or informal covenants against racial integration.^(ref)  Agents and sellers resisted sale to black families.  If an African-American did manage to buy a home in a suburban setting, whites would often sell and move out.^(ref)

Few colleges would admit African-Americans.  In the south where 80% of African-Americans lived, only a few black colleges were available.  They were generally underfunded and lower quality than the white schools.  Their limited number and capacity resulted in thousands of applicants being turned away.  Only a small percentage of African-American veterans benefited from the program.

Discrimination was aggressive for returning veterans.  Employers preferentially hired whites under most circumstances and were hesitant to promote non-whites who did manage to find employment.

An entire generation blossomed and moved ahead, and the country became a world leader through economic progress, but African-Americans were systematically held back.  It was deliberate.  The effects are visible today.  In the race to get ahead, "Whites have a hundred-yard head start in a four-hundred yard race."

The result:
The ghettos were born.  African-Americans were generally constrained to urban living, lower-paying work, and limited opportunity for improvement.  It had nothing to do with their intellect, work ethic, or virtue.  Other minorities were affected similarly.  Social stability declined predictably and inevitably in the neighborhoods.^(ref)  

Long-term impact: in 1984, the median white household has a net worth of $39,000; median black household, $3400, mostly accounted for by differences in homeownership. Nearly 70% of whites own homes, with average value of $52,000; only 40% of blacks do, with median value of under $30,000.  (Figures for net worth in 2000 are $81,000 and $8000.)

During the civil rights era, we passed laws against discriminatory business and banking practices. We changed laws regarding school admission. Today's assistance projects and equal opportunity programs are attempts to mitigate the harm done by individual and group bias, discrimination, and selfishness. We've worked hard to adjust our national attitude about accepting differences. Such cultural efforts were (and continue to be) vigorously resisted by conservative elements. 

Conscious and unconscious discrimination persists today.  It's an artificial constraint imposed without reasonable basis.  We've made progress, but our bias seems to resurface with each generation.   

This isn't a new issue for America's majority.  Without a reasonable basis to support our reasoning:
- we presumed we were superior to native Americans.
- we presumed we were superior to Africans.
- we presumed we were superior to Irish, Italian, and eastern European immigrants.  And Jews.  And Mexicans.
- we presumed men were superior to women.
- we presumed white folks were superior to non-white folks.
- we presume the comfortably established and privileged are superior to the non-wealthy.

- did you know? we've discovered in many universities today, white males are presumed to be intellectually superior to females and minorities despite performance metrics to the contrary.  These are institutions that aggressively pursue equality and diversity, so study results like this are a bit of a surprise.

What might be the root of such inaccurate thinking?
Is there a single character point that covers it?  Of course.

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Discrimination is common but fortunately not universal.  While bias persists in the culture, some have seen with clarity and deliberately pursued a different way.  By itself, information like this does little to avert a life of self-centeredness and separation.  Perhaps until we are profoundly changed, such bias will resurface throughout our lives.