The Quotas That Won't Die

Forty years ago, the Nixon administration (building on the Johnson administration's attempt to transform the Small Business Administration into a weapon in the War on Poverty) undertook efforts to enhance "black capitalism," using Section 8a of the Small Business Act to provide preferences, assistance, and loans based on the race of government contractors. Thus was born race- and gender-conscious contracting which would become endemic. From the U.S. State Department to city garbage collection, contracts at all levels of government employ race and gender preferences.
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