Corporate America's messages of "wokeness" are meaningless, here's a better idea

There's an epidemic spreading across America much faster than COVID-19. Luckily, it's a virus that has no real potency.. other than annoying people.

What is this epidemic of emptiness exactly?

It's the corporate statements about racism in light of the police killing of George Floyd and the protests, riots, and looting that have ensued as a result across the country.

You can't go on social media or check your emails these days without seeing some kind of statement from a CEO or another top corporate leader talking about how committed they are to fighting racism in and out of their companies.

Now, I have no doubt that just about all the CEOs and other executives making these statements have good intentions. It's just that almost all of them resort to platitudes and pseudo-wisdom that induces eye rolling on all sides. It's as if a chorus of leading politicians and corporate executives have all joined to sing another cliched flat note taken from the same old uninspiring songbook.

But is there something corporate America can do more than provide fleeting lip service to the issue of racism? The answer is "yes," but first we have to pinpoint what aspect of racism our esteemed corporate leaders really can change.

Focusing on the Floyd case, the push to end police brutality doesn't really seem to be one of those things. If an investigation and a trial end up proving what we suspect from the video to be true -- that Officer Derek Chauvin used excessive and deadly force to subdue and arrest Floyd -- that still doesn't change what almost everyone in the private sector can or can't do about police racism or brutality. Another passionate corporate executive's email crafted by the p.r. department or another sensitivity training exercise program for company employees won't do anything about helping to avoid the next cop from losing it on a suspect during an arrest.

Ending the way some people think poorly of other ethnic groups is a noble goal, and maybe even one that corporations can help to achieve on a small scale. But how exactly will we know when success in this area has been achieved? Will companies hire mind readers to assess how everyone is thinking? Will a drop in reported racial or bias complaints at certain workplaces suffice? The "changing minds" strategy seems like a path where success is way too hard to measure.

So let's remember that corporations are economic entities, and the best way they can affect change in America's toughest regions is by doing what they can to measurably improve the economic viability and vitality in those areas.

Here is an incontrovertible fact that only a fool would deny: there is a clear disparity in economic opportunities for blacks in America, especially for those living in predominantly black neighborhoods. That lack of ample opportunity is a direct product of unequal educational opportunities that start in the home to be sure, but present themselves in K-12 formal schooling. Racism of all kinds, especially the soft racism of lowered expectations, plays a role in that sub-par schooling. This is a major root of the problem that exacerbates race-based enmity and the economic punishment that comes along with it.

Let me put it in more basic terms and look at the South Side of Chicago for an example. Despite spending more per student than almost any other school system in the nation, Chicago's public school graduation rate is nothing short of a social scandal and an economic nuclear bomb that's already gone off. You can have the lowest tax rates and no public debt, but your city will never survive if 40% of the population never even finishes high school and most of the rest still can't do college work or have marketable skills. That's the reality in Chicago right now. The person who first told me of those dreary statistics and came to that overall conclusion was a billionaire hedge fund manager who just happens to run his business in Chicago.

This is a good time to remind Americans that Affirmative Action college admissions and hiring practices both belong in the "too little/too late" category when it comes to what corporate America and our colleges can do to fix educational disparities. Waiting until a person is college age to provide them with access to a top education is really a ridiculous notion.

Similarly, Affirmative Action hiring can be summed up like this: American companies look to hire more minorities who are already qualified or relatively qualified to fill open positions. In return, those companies get to think they've done some out-sized good by hiring qualified people. Sorry but those practices, and even minority internship programs, seem more like ineffectual tokenism that represents a drop in the overall bucket.

What about the people who can't even come close to being qualified for those jobs or internships? What about those who wouldn't even think to apply for those openings? It's important to note that elite colleges and top corporations aren't inundated with minority applicants hoping to take advantage of Affirmative Action. The opposite is true, as employers and schools fight hard to get the attention of any and all potentially qualified candidates. This is why it's always a strong minority student who gets accepted to all eight Ivy League schools every year. The schools are willing to take a risk on being rejected by that applicant, (something that lowers their rankings on those annual "top college" lists), because filling the spaces they want to allot to minority applicants is never easy. The supply is there. but because of poor K-12 schooling, the demand isn't high enough.

Last October, I explained a process that elite colleges should follow to put real money and concern where their Affirmative Action mouths are. That included spending more than empty virtue-signalling time and setting up free tuition private schools in the poorest minority neighborhoods across the country. Again, that idea is more expensive than just searching for and admitting minority applicants to their colleges. It also would require colleges to slay the sacred liberal cow of falling in line with public school teachers unions. But if they really care about narrowing the educational opportunity gap, they'd look very closely at the idea. I'm not holding my breath, as our supposedly best universities in this country have long strayed from intellectual pursuits as their main goal. Instead, growing their endowments and living off the not-for-profit salary racket are the real goals these days for too many of our college presidents and administrators.

But corporate America could be different. Now that so many CEOs are so bent on chiming in when it comes to the fight against racial disparities, I call on the Fortune 500 companies to take the lead in this private educational effort. The cash piles companies like Apple are sitting on are immense, and even 5% of that cash could easily pay for setting up dozens of excellent free-tuition private schools across the country.

This has to be a hands on effort by the companies, and not just big virtue-signalling donations to the existing failing public schools. If you want to know how that kind of publicity-grabbing stunt works out, just check out the public school system in Newark, New Jersey and how it did relatively nothing effective with the $100 million gift it received from Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg in 2010.

If you think billionaires and billion-dollar companies setting up free tuition schools in disadvantaged areas sounds like a pipe dream, it isn't. In fact, the world's richest man is already doing it as Jeff Bezos is putting $2 billion into free tuition kindergartens for thousands of Americans.

But in addition to K-12 schools, corporate America must still do more. The major tech companies should focus on helping all Americans avoid the liberal arts college tuition trap by setting up tech trade schools across the nation. This is an overdue idea that transcends the racism and opportunity gap issues, as top tech leaders like Bill Gates have decried the lack of adequately trained Americans for years.

The good news in all of this is that creating better schools, no matter the cost, is still in corporate America's economic best interests. More qualified workers in the employment pool will increase productivity and spur innovation. And just think about how the neighborhoods where those K-12 and trade schools will see increased property values and better retail opportunities.

The best part is that all of this is based on corporations pursuing a selfish economic interest, something they do best, that just happens to coincide with a social good they supposedly want to promote. As Milton Friedman taught us, the world's greatest accomplishments come from individuals pursuing their self interests.

By contrast when corporate leaders mimic grandstanding politicians with social media posts and open letters decrying racism, the only self interest they're pursuing is an ephemeral stamp of politically correct approval. You can ask all the supposedly "woke" businesses that were still looted and vandalized this past week how much that's worth.

No, our top companies can't fix all the endemic problems in our poorest neighborhoods. But a lot will be accomplished by ignoring the destructive critics from the left and right, slaying political sacred cows, and just showing up in those areas to begin training those populations to succeed at the earliest practical moment.

So stop with all the emails and social media posts that change nothing and no one will remember tomorrow. Put your money where your mouths are and not only will you make real positive changes, you'll also fulfill your real job by making your shareholders richer too.