Taboo: 10 Facts You Can't Talk About

by Wilfred Reilly

a whole range of other factors predict success in life as much as or more than race does. A short list of these might include sexual orientation, sex, attractiveness, height, weight, IQ, aggression, birth order, urban (as opposed to rural) status, Northern (as opposed to Southern) status, Christianity (as opposed to “oppressed” minority religions), “cisgender” status, and social class. Prager convincingly points out that perhaps the most important privilege in modern society is simply being raised by a stable two-parent family. The poverty rate is 7 percent for the Black children of married couples and almost 25 percent for the white children of single moms. My own calculations indicate that, with non-racial factors fully controlled for, the effect of simply not being white on the life outcomes of minority Americans is on the order of 2–3 percent. In fact, in the affirmative action era, Black and Hispanic Americans not infrequently seem to have the advantage when competing for a particular collegiate spot or Fortune 1000 job.