volving seniority systems in employment. When the economy compels cutbacks in the work force, the last hired (usually minority workers) are the first fired, and the Supreme Court has grappled with the question of whether layoffs and firings may be made on the basis of race in order to maintain a balanced work force. The Court has held that minority employees may not be given artificially high seniority status when no actual discrimination had been directed toward them, and it has upheld employment seniority systems even if they result in a heavier burden to minorities, provided such systems were not created with discriminatory intent. In 1986 the Court invalidated an "affirmative action" plan that gave minority employees more protection against layoffs than it gave others. Nevertheless, where there is a compelling need to eradicate past discrimination, the federal courts have a great deal of latitude in creating "affirmative action" programs to rectify that injustice, and the courts can order a program that gives benefits to more than those who were the actual victims of discrimination. As of 1988, however, the Supreme Court was still divided in its approaches to this highly controversial area. However, public opinion polls show that even among whites about two-thirds of the people support affirmative action programs in employment. Although both sex and race (employment) segregation have declined in the past 25 years, in the 1990s workers' sex and race still affect the jobs they hold--with white men still over-represented in the best paying jobs," writes Barbara F. Reskin in her report, "The Realities of Affirmative Action in Employment". In her analysis of the labor market in 1996, Reskin, professor of sociology at Harvard University, found "almost 30 percent of white workers held managerial or professional jobs, compared with about one in five African-Americans and about one in seven Hispanics." Keep this in mind when debating af...
