Singh mentions three things that have gotten expensive: public higher education, healthcare, and housing. Each of these have heavy government intervention. He mentions consumer electronics and goods that have gotten less expensive. Each of these have significantly less government intervention. Anyone else see a pattern here?

"What did we get since the 1970s? Cheap electronics... cheap consumer goods... costly education... really expensive healthcare." Nikhil Pal Singh I got two questions. What sectors of the economy are most controlled by government? Education and Healthcare? And what sectors of the economy does the government have little to do with? Electronics and Consumer Goods? I think we found the problem.

School wasn't "FREE" in California. It was paid for by the taxpayers. The reason it's so expensive now is all of the government money pouring into it. College is expensive now because the kids aren't paying for it. Make colleges compete and take the government money out of it and the market would drive the prices down.

It doesn't seem like they're having the same conversation. Riley talks about the actual effects of affirmative action. Singh says "nuh uh" then proceeds to talk about something completely different (the price of schools) as if it was relevant in the least to the conversation they're having.

It also casts a shadow over the reputation of those who would qualify for quotas; leading to the assumption that they wouldn't be where they were if they had to have the same abilities as those not in the quota system.

Nikhil Singh got cooked

3:20 So, the stuff where the gov't stayed out got cheaper, but the heavily regulated stuff got more expensive. Where have I heard that before?

Affirmative action should never have been just get more women and minorities in terms of raw numbers. It should have assured that woman and minorities were not refused positions just because they were women or a minority.

When I was a student at Stanford 1968-1973, I had 2 Black faculty and it did not help or hinder me. i do not care

Why is it a good thing that more women are in academia and the work force, instead of being at home raising healthy, well-adjusted children?

The change in our culture (more working wives, etc.) was likely much more influential than any policy. Dr. Singh conflates changing times with policy impacts, in my opinion.

The most pertinent question about AA is: When does it END?

Affirmative action puts unqualified people in colleges and jobs they are not prepared to handle. It also makes people question if a Black person is competent for the position they are in.

Quality over diversity

Nikhil Pal doesn't make sense

"I'm just quoting statistics" No, you're torturing math to make it say what you want it to say. There is no evidence that those faculty would NOT have been added if not for affirmative action.

a "diverse faculty" is not needed

Increased tuition? Well, I can't *possibly* imagine that this was directly caused by easy, unlimited student loans. Increased health care? This can't *possibly* be the result of significant increases in regulation. Increased housing prices? This can't *possibly* be the result of regulation and "affirmative action" style mortgage qualifications! Sheesh!

4:30 "Racial and gender distributions in university changed ... and that's a good thing." - Yes, there are now TWICE as many women as men in universities. In some areas it's a 9:1 ratio (psychology, English, social work, etc) - For someone who claims to be about equality, he certainly seems to be cheering on discrimination.

That's a first. A guy from India thats bad at math

"I don't think the data actually shows that." Fella try coming up with a more credible argument than "I don't want to hear evidence contrary to my beliefs."

costs have gone up due to the new army of ADMINISTRATORS and useless AMENITIES

I think these debates are useless if neither side has principles. The principle, I think, is that expecting excellence is the only way to drive people out of poverty. Affirmative action pulls against that. It says that if you have a particular skin color or set of organs, you can skip the line. The problem is, skipping the line doesn't mean you are qualified for the position you get by skipping the line. Based on the principle that excellence is what we strive for, how do you we serve communities that have fallen behind the mark. The anti-affirmative action side is saying that if affirmative action didn't exist, it would have happened on its own merit. The pro affirmative action side is trying to take credit for what was already happening.

Jason. Always. The other. Never.

Facts matter. Thank you, Jason Riley.

The system is not racist against black Americans, it is racist on behalf of black Americans. I am a white man, and Affirmative Action caused me to be homeless. I couldn’t get financial help when I needed it, because of my color and my gender. Sick to death of the whining.

It sets all of society to fail when degrees are awarded based on oppression points, and feelings are treated as more important than facts or merit.

What lowering the standards on everything including testing of accomplishment and merit? You don't think that would cause a problem

It's clearly a racist policy. People were willing to accept it because it was supposed to be racist against the right people. It turns out that it was more racist against the minorities it intended to help. Since it was hatched by the same political party that was created to maintain slavery, it makes sense that the result may have been intentional.

Nikhil is typical of pro-AA arguers, unfortunately. Typically unversed in and avoidant of the relevant data. When pressed on the issue, responds with either silence or changing the subject (Harvard faculty, the military). To be fair, the debate was about "progressive government," rather than affirmative action per se, and I could tell he didn't want to engage this particular subject because frankly he knows it's total baloney. Jason Riley had him pegged on every detail, from the history of UC to his citation of The Shape of the River.

Excellent conversation - thank you for allowing us to listen in.

In Singh's worldview, there are only rich and poor, and facts only matter if he likes the conclusions he can draw from them. "I reject your reality and substitute my own."

Singh: "The US Military is one of the most respected institutions in American society" Gene: "Libertarians don't respect it that much" Gene FTW

People are complicated. Feedback loops are unpredictable. Very interesting.

Can we get the data mentioned in the description or put in the screen?? This just seems like both people going “I HAVE THE STUDIES AND FACTS”

The disconnect between "affirmative action" (what a dumb term) and quality control is significant. What is the benefit of funneling unqualified people into business, academia and government for the sake of "equity" or "representation"?

Jason knocked this out of the park. Well said.

It's not that simple gentleman. There are things called confounders that you seem to be completely ignoring on both sides of this aisle

these progressives are so smug and dismissive

Not three minutes in and this NYU prof has demonstrated how unprepared he is for this debate. He has no clue that the reduction of black enrollees in Berkley is directly connected to the increase in black graduation rates. I'm glad I saw this clip so that I don't have to watch the whole debate, which I can confidently say must have been a total slaughter.

When Affirmative Action, originally known as "preferential treatment" began, we were told it would be needed "for a while" to compensate for past injustices. That was sixty years ago and we are told it is still needed. Just how much longer is "a while?"And don't say "As long as it takes!"

figures dont lie , but liers figure

Affirmative action in this day and age is BS and should be eliminated. What’s funny is that these 2 guys’ voices sound exactly alike.

If the goal is to help those in need, then help should be given based upon the needs of the individual, regardless of race, gender, etc. Race, gender, etc. do not indicate neediness, neediness indicates neediness.

I suspect youths are going to need 20 years to react to Riley on KZfaq the way youths are reacting to Thomas Sowell today.

bringing in a list of faculty members is not statistics. SMH

Good comeback "I don't think the data actually shows that..." Can be used anytime you just don't agree but have no data.

Ah yes... We think too much about black students getting into Harvard vs the whole system... Also black students weren't going to Berkeley, they were only going to Davis! The horror! Oh yeah, and they graduated from Davis instead of failing to graduate at Berkeley. But that doesn't matter.

Affirmative action is a fancy way to give out fish. What happens when the company fails or downsizes? What is the employees upward mobility within the company? They'll be the first to go

The point about increased female faculty membership after affirmative action doesn’t strike home for me. At that same time there was a massive cultural shift in the role of women in the household and in our society. Without affirmative action I would have anticipated such an increase.

I mean no disrespect. If these are men in California. I understand.

It seems strange to hear an Asian arguing for Affirmative Action until you find out that he’s part of the professoriat.

*Does affirmative action 'set up smart kids to fail?'* is a poorly worded question. A better question would be "Does affirmative action set up smart kids, who have not earned their spot based on merit, to fail? Example of this type of possible failure, due to affirmative action: Refusing to fail a medical student, based on test scores and demonstration of not understanding the curriculum, sets up a the beneficiary of affirmative action to fail as an actual doctor.

How long has affirmative action been going on? And when are we actually going to see any progress from it?

Great debate. Thank you for uploading this. Jason Riley had facts. Singh talking points.

One person is saying that blacks were doing better in society. The other is saying that colleges and universities hired more blacks. In his mind, these are the same statements. I'm going to assume hes an academic "intellectual"

There’s also the problem with administrative fraud of just filling in races to fill in quotas. It happened to me. A college filled in my race code for me as black.

AA isn’t the only factor for why blacks slowed down catching up in 1970s. There are social factors like war on drugs, welfare, fall of two parent homes etc.

Percentage of black student graduation rates went up. But raw numbers of black students went down. Keep it real.

They need all the help they can get or they are smart enough to obtain with merit alone. I think we'll all be better off with meritocracy alone. I have faith in them.

The pro affirmative action guy got his tail kicked in this debate.

It is setting up people to go in debt and drop out of prestigious universities. When they could have gotten the degree, cheaper, at a less competitive school.

It isnt helping to improve the wealth gap, Quality of life or self worth of these groups but look how colorful our campus is! Cuz that's what REALLY matters

50 people take a test however only the top 5 receive rewards. Five people win the two best scores and three minority win even though they had lower test scores. The result is all 48 people hold resentment because they know they did better than the people that actually won. Without affirmative action the top five would have won and everyone would carry on just fine. But because some know they did better than the winners it causes massive resentment for 48 out of 50 people. The two with the highest test score are the only ones okay with this scenario. The 48 carry on their lives knowing they were ripped off and it bothers people for years. DEI might as well stand for didn't earn it.

Certain protected classes hate merit, why?

Affirmative action in the US armed forces has not gone as well as that feller thinks.

I don't think "diversifying the professions" is in any way a good unto itself. If they had 1,5% female professors yes it was likely in part due to past cultural exclusion, even if laws were changed it would take some time for more women to get all the way to top spots. If women (blacks) were barred at some point - remove the barrier, then this still may take whole 2 generations to right itself to natural level. But should they get to exactly 50% in exactly every discipline? I don't think there's anything wrong with having 90% female stomatologists and 90% male physicists. If personal preferences lead fewer people of one sex pursuing it, fewer of them becoming excellent in it, they SHOULD have fewer top spots. Ramming in extra 40% of the other sex even when less qualified is undermining such discipline. Not only average level goes down, it also poisons the whole culture of the place. Before they were the most renowned in x and pretty secure in that. Now they are a % of the best and an ad-mixture of good or mediocre who were promoted to fill quotas. If they now get into a conversation on top level of the field... they can't do it. They would unmask impostors who won't be able to follow. Everybody has to lie and act as if they are still in that previous room, but now walking on eggshells not to break this lie, or more likely just withdraw out of risky situations. It doesn't collapse the institution on itself but it weakens it. Add political activism, DEI indoctrination, Maoist empowering of student grievance and it just might collapse the whole thing.

5:47 it's clear his math is wrong. It's the other way around, affirmative action helped to expand the black middle class

I’m starting to thing EVERY progressive policy gets things ass backwards

Does mismatch work the other way too. When a more competitive than average cohort of asian students end up at a school, then what effect if any does that have on things like: The relative academic success. The perception of asian academic talent. The confidence these students had entering the workforce an embarking on their careers.

All standards fall for some reason with affirmation of anything.

Why isn’t the over representation of jewish students at ivy leagues ever brought up? How does 2% of the population get nearly 20% representation at the most elite schools??

What I think the data really shows is that upper and middle-upper class minorities are better positioned to benefit from affirmative action. It's a bit of a stretch to say that no minority anywhere has benefited from affirmative action. However that's not the same as it being a benefit to all minorities. Middle and lower-class minorities have shown less social mobility because all middle and lower-class people have had less social mobility. So the question is one of objective, are you intending to help disadvantaged people or do you simply want a diverse, however you measure it, upper class.

Why is parity in professions "really really good thing for our society"? Which professions is it ok to just let the men handle?

I thought mismatch theory has been debunked

Someone needs to explain government guaranteed loans to this guy.

Kamala Harris is a perfect example of an identity appointment. She is Black, and a woman (presumably); is she a good representation of either? I’m not impressed with justice Jackson either.

India is a example of the failure which we done using reservation in the name of caste. And we r suffering. Next 140 year same things will occur

Was Nikhil Pal Singh an affirmative action hire? He doesn't seem to even address the core statement from Riley.

Affirmative action is a self-fulfilling prophecy. The statement that "affirmative action has increased racial and sexual diversity, therefore it's working" is obviously true (people respond to incentives), but working towards what, exactly? Racial and sexual diversity for racial and sexual diversity's sake is silly. The valuable type of diversity is diversity of _thought_ . "But ProductBasement, racial and sexual diversity correlates highly with diversity of thought, and racial and sexual minorities won't want to attend a school or work at a company where they don't see others like them!" That ^^ is because YOU told everyone that race and sex are everything!

White-haired dude can't see the forest from the trees

Representation at ivy league schools means nothing to everyone else on the lower rings of society.

I think that this series and the Monk series of debates are some of the best around.

Can’t schools and companies just hire or accept people based on merit and ability, rather than the color of their skin? It is so silly.

Just get out of their way and let them learn on their own if they fail it's their fault if they succeed it's their fault.

Having women in high places has been a disaster DIE is their project

Two proponents of identity politics arguing over the colors of people with titles. People like these two are the problem with our country.

damn.. jason riley SMOKED nikhil here

3 minutes in and the qtip already stepped on his own words.

📊 ~ Why not say the Vietnam war hurt the black community instead of affirmative action? It happened at the same time. Or why not say the voting rights act hurt blacks. But seriously, it could be the drug war or a number of other reasons that things have changed. You can’t just look at one statistics whether it makes common sense or not, and in this case I would say it does not make common sense on the face of it. But towards the end of the video the guy against affirmative action finally said some thing that could make sense. It may be his overall right, and maybe he’s not. But I would love to know whether people who were legacy students (meaning they are normally white kids who got affirmative action because their parents went to the school) or hurt later on in life or if there are fraternities and the good old boy system Took care of them even though they had low grades, but black students were just thought to be affirmative action babies. Obviously complete double standard. But ultimately, affirmative action can take place without lowering standards. Or at least lowering standards enough that the person is likely to get C’s or D’s.

Forest from the trees.

moving the goalposts, shocking

This is essentially a microcosm of current left vs right. The right here are these facts, & data points. The Left well I reject your facts, & look at how much better people feel.

Shape black bloke his clearly extremely smart and knows his stuff.

I thought that in Ca, and other states, have the racial preference in college. Isn't that why Asaian ppl have filed lawsuits against colleges? Namely harvard. 🤷‍♀️

Mr. Sing has serious problem in the field of statistics and data analysis and evaluation. He reads books and put all the confidence on the authors without looking into the selection bias, analytical bias and commercial bias. He could be a politicians not knowing how to read scientific studies and mislead himself and others by not asking the first question, whether the data actually represent the population to justify the inferences. All the so called gain that he is talking about claiming affirmative action's success are fallacy. Product survives because of its intrinsic value and service, you can inflate that at the beginning but the free market will show the real winner in the long run. It is funny that he thinks that the colleges and universities have similar percent of male and female and blacks and whites because they were given some favor at the beginning. That will produce diversity in the look but how about quality? I think he is confusing affirmative action with equal opportunity, which is essential. Everybody is not necessarily interested or be good in everything. Doe he think that NBA and other sports areas with huge majority of blacks were due to affirmative action? Or those blacks were unstoppable to produce results by slamming on others face?

Yes.

I am not very worried about the general dumb policies some western countries are following (race, diversity, gender, etc), because those countries are already falling in relevance weight in the world scene (because of those irrational policies). So, a sort of natural selection of cultures are sorting it automatically. UK probably is the quickiest falling country in the West. US is still a superpower but its loss of positions in main fields is already visible and its GDP is losing value in comparison with other zones. The next big step down is the loss of dollar as a global currency. Current US and UK administrations are working hard to further erode these two countries' position in the world. However, those admins are not the culprit, it is the mayority of those societies who are falling apart, mentally speaking. They are who consent and even promote those agendas. If somebody wondered how European middle age (or similar civ decadences) happened, just sit down, take a popcorn bag and watch.

What about black voters? Would AA have passed if there weren’t black voters? Politicians don’t get elected or re-elected unless they appeal to voters. That means by the time any policy that assumes new authority (i.e., denies freedom), comes as a consequence of shifts in voter opinions-politicians don’t start the parade, they hitch a ride at the front. The extra weight often drags down results and makes it harder to change direction around potholes. Social change by mandate slows or reversed progress because it energizes opposition around a point in what is often a generational process that happens naturally and less violently over time. The economics were there to support it until government decided to subsidize (pay to have) higher education prices. Tech got cheaper until the next generation of legislators figured out how to use it. AA cannot work based on wishful thinking that laws control feelings or morality.

Wide open immigration should help with housing and medical costs. BWAHAHAHAHAHAHA