Politicians seem to have a special fondness for words that have
two very different meanings, so we are likely to hear a lot of
these kinds of words this election year.
“Access” is one of those words. Politicians seem to be forever
coming to the rescue of people who have been denied “access” to
credit, college or whatever.
But what does that mean, concretely?
It could mean that some external force is blocking you from
whatever your goal might be. Or it could mean that you just don’t
have whatever it takes to reach that goal.
To take a personal example, Michael Jordan became a basketball
star — and a very rich man. I did neither. Was that because I was
denied “access” to professional basketball?
Anyone who saw me as a teenager trying to play basketball could
tell you that I was lucky to hit the back board, much less the
basket.
By the first definition, I had as much “access” to the NBA as
Michael Jordan had. Nobody was blocking me. They didn’t have to
block, because I was not going to make the basket — or the NBA —
anyway.
Making a distinction between external and internal reasons for
failing to reach one’s goal would clarify the meaning of the word
“access.” But clarification would destroy the political usefulness
of the word, along with the government programs that this word is
used to justify.
For years, politicians and the media went ballistic over the
fact that different groups had different approval rates for
mortgage loans. This was supposed to show that some racial groups
were denied “access” to mortgage loans, and especially access to
the most desired loans with the lowest interest rates.
No one even asked the question: Denied access by which
definition of “access”?
Political crusaders don’t pause to define words. Their shrill
rhetoric suggested that external barriers were the problem. And
that meant government intervention was the solution, to smite the
wicked and deliver “social justice” (another undefined term).
When statistics showed that blacks were turned down for
conventional mortgage loans at twice the rate of whites, that was
the clincher for those saying that “access” was the problem and
that racial discrimination was the reason. Since this fit the
existing preconceptions in many quarters, what more could you
want?
Other statistics, however, showed that whites were turned down
for conventional mortgage loans at nearly double the rate for Asian
Americans. By the very same reasoning, that would suggest that
whites were being racially discriminated against by banks that were
mostly run by whites.
But this unlikely conclusion never surfaced, because the second
set of statistics seldom saw the light of day in the mainstream
media, even though both sets of statistics were available from the
same sources.
To publish the second set of statistics would undermine the
whole moral melodrama in the media, and the political crusade based
on it.
Statistics on the average credit ratings of people in different
racial groups likewise seldom saw the light of day. The average
credit ratings of whites were higher than the average credit
ratings of blacks, and the average credit ratings of Asian
Americans were higher than the average credit ratings of
whites.
But to lay all these facts before the public and say, “We
report, you decide” might well result in the public’s deciding that
banks and other financial institutions prefer lending to
individuals who were more likely to pay them back.
Also lost in media stories was the fact that many, if not most,
of the financial officials who actually made loan approval
decisions never laid eyes on the people who applied, but based
their decisions on the paperwork sent by those who dealt directly
with the applicants.
Equal “access” does not automatically lead to equal outcomes,
either in lending institutions or in basketball, or anywhere else.
But words like “access” have led to much political success and much
economic disaster, the housing market being just one example.
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