<p>^That, too, is something of concern. Affirmative action is definitely being used and abused.</p>
<p>Why do you guys always argue about this. Its part of college admissions. Get used to it…SMH. What you guys spend time typing won’t change anything. Sorry to say.</p>
<p>Lobzz, I hope you’re not a Penn student or grad. You’re very good at summarily dismissing ideas that you dislike, but you lack any ability to refute arguments with reason or fact. </p>
<p>Everything I said was based on actual situations. A person who owns a business can deduct business expenses from business income. Business expenses are defined broadly by the IRS and business owners take huge liberties with the category. Business expenses include vehicles and business trips (that are vacations for family members who tag along); these easily fall within IRS guidelines. Home offices can also be deducted under IRS guidelines. Other expenses push the envelope, such as requiring the gardener for your business to also include your home in its bill (a very common move) or having the business purchase an RV, boat, or other luxury item that your family can enjoy (another common move). Some business owners actually purchase homes that they lease back to their owners. This move keeps the assets out of the owner’s name and the business then pays the taxes, insurance, etc. In addition, depending on the corporate form of the entity involved, an individual owner’s taxable income is simply the income the owner pulls out of the business each year, and income can be easily kept with the business. Hiding income is an American tradition for business owners. If you doubt this, your being intentionally obtuse. Or maybe it’s not intentional for you. </p>
<p>Another very good way to legal hide assets is through the use of family trusts. The owners of the property give up legal title to the trust and become trust beneficiaries. They still enjoy economic rights in the property, even though the trust holds title to the property. </p>
<p>Since you’re slow on the uptake, I’ll type this explanation very slowly for you: The opposite is also true; some people whose families barely get by (and have no money for college) look rich on paper. Talk with a farmer. On paper, many farmers possess assets that are very valuable (land and equipment), but those assets are not liquid and cannot be easily turned into liquid assets. These people look rich on paper but are not. </p>
<p>The bottom line is that there is no way for an adcom to easily determine whether an applicant is truly disadvantaged from a financial perspective. Some rich people will appear poor, while some poor people will appear rich. This is the reason why finances are used for aid but not for admission.</p>
<p>You asked: “How does a wealthy Hispanic-or African-AMERICAN from New York differ from a wealthy Caucasian-AMERICAN from the same state in any way that warrants a substantial advantage in admission?” First, the advantage is not substantial. Second, in this country a person’s social experiences do not depend solely on wealth, as you assume. A rich African American will be subject to the same racial prejudices as any other African American. Ask a wealthy African American from NYC how easy it is for them to get a taxi to stop for them late at night. Ask them about finding jobs. Ask them if people treat them differently just because their parents are wealthy. Ask them how many times they’ve been pulled over by police for no reason. The prejudices of this country don’t stop when a URM has money. More importantly, their perspectives on life don’t change either, so they bring a great deal of value to a college campus, regardless of how much money their parents make. </p>
<p>College adcoms are very bright people, and they have heard and rejected all of your “simple” solutions to a very complex issue. </p>
<p>I am a college freshmen who very much enjoys learning with people of all backgrounds, races, etc. I was raised in a predominantly white area, and although I value my upbringing, I realize that my current situation is much richer and dynamic. I wish Penn was even more diverse than it is. I’d love to see more URMs on campus, and I am part of a Penn organization who is pushing to see that next year’s class is even more diverse than ever before.</p>
<p>/argument, anybody? Please?</p>
<p>So I learned from this thread California had banned affirmative action a long time ago. </p>
<p>[Fall2010EthnicDistribution</a> < Main < TWiki](<a href=“http://osr2.berkeley.edu/twiki/bin/view/Main/Fall2010EthnicDistribution]Fall2010EthnicDistribution”>http://osr2.berkeley.edu/twiki/bin/view/Main/Fall2010EthnicDistribution)</p>
<p>If you look at the ethnic distribution at UC Berkeley it’s pretty easy to see that URMs are underrepresented there (except Hispanics, who have pretty decent numbers). Now if affirmative action didn’t really matter, why would this be the case? Why do URMs have no problem with representing at UPenn and other schools with affirmative action while they have trouble representing at UC Berkeley? Obviously affirmative action must matter, maybe just a teeny bit.</p>
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<p>and how will AA change this situation? Okay, a URM gets an education at Harvard, becomes extremely wealthy, and lives in NYC. He tries to stop a taxi late at night…is the cab driver going to know that he went to Harvard and to therefore stop for him?</p>
<p>AA doesn’t alleviate racism…it fuels it, IMO. </p>
<p>And no one is saying that AA based on socioeconomic background is going to be completely flawless, but it is fairer than the current AA that is based on race. </p>
<p>erolimes - there is always value in discussion…no matter how much it seems like we’re going in circles, discussions influence opinions, views, policies, etc. We shouldn’t just ignore a controversial subject.</p>
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<p>This is both correct and incorrect. Unfortunately, I don’t have the patience to nitpick. However, here’s a link to the IRS website. Interpret it as you please. I personally believe that anything other than what is written on this website is considered fraud (regardless of whether or not it is technically within jurisprudence).</p>
<p>[Business</a> Expenses](<a href=“http://www.irs.gov/businesses/small/article/0,,id=109807,00.html]Business”>http://www.irs.gov/businesses/small/article/0,,id=109807,00.html)</p>
<p>While what you’re saying is true, it is still essentially fraudulent behavior. And to go back to our initial point, colleges don’t take that into account.</p>
<p>Powerbomb seems to be on the same page as me. AA based on socioeconomic status is far from flawless, but it is a lot better than AA that is based on ethnicity.</p>
<p>jb5555, you seem to have many personal issues with this whole Affirmative Action thing. Just accept it as a reality, and move on.</p>
<p>Guys, let’s all chillax here. We’re all going to get rejected come December 10th anyway. <3</p>
<p>Yeah I think that this thread has gotten a little far from my original question…</p>
<p>lol…idontjoke - you should have seen this coming the minute you typed URM in the title.</p>
<p>I laughed at the discussion of how business owners deduct regular family expenses as business expenses. All of my uncles are businessmen in Southern California. At family get togethers most of the discussion is about how to turn regular expenses into deductible expenses. It’s pretty hilarious what they go through to pay less taxes. </p>
<p>As for AA, don’t worry about it, people. I was once like you are. I used to worry that I would be rejected because I was Asian. I had a great application but so did every other Asian in my inner circle. We used to get together and lament about blacks at our school who were going to get into schools with lower scores, but in the end we were all accepted into great schools. The only school that seemed to care a great deal about race was Stanford. We Asians were all rejected by Stanford but an AA girl from our class with lower scores was admitted. Other than Stanford, my friends and I were admitted into just about every school to which we applied. As long as you send out 10-12 applications, AA won’t hurt you. Trust me!!!</p>
<p>I have Econ to attend to, so I’m just going to summarize what I have to and catch you guys later.</p>
<p>-I am all for AA; just not the Affirmative that wrongly includes those who do not deserve it. This begs the question: Who, then, deserves to benefit from affirmative action, Lobzz? The answer: People who were put at a disadvantage due to their socioeconomic status (be it African-Americans, Hispanic-Americans, Asian-Americans, or plain old Caucasians). If you want to play the “racism” card, so be it; racism happens to just about everybody.</p>
<p>-How do you ascertain one’s socioeconomic status, Lobzz? The answer: generally by income. (if fraudulent methods are employed in order to manipulate this, then that’s for the fraud’s conscience to deal with. If colleges find out, said fraud is in trouble; if colleges don’t find out, said fraud is a fraud anyway) Bottom line: Income is a good measure of socioeconomic status.</p>
<p>-The UCs eliminated race-based AA. Here are the demographics of Berkeley as of fall 2010: Percent of African Americans- 3.4%
Percent of Latino-Americans- 11.5%</p>
<p>Now, compare these to Yale’s demographics: Percent of African-Americans: 7%
Percent of Latino-Americans: 7%</p>
<p>It balances out.</p>
<p>Almost forgot about Native Americans :)</p>
<p>Yale: 1% (probably rounded)
Berkeley: 0.8%</p>
<p>Lobzz, when I was a senior I attend a symposium on Prop 209 and it impact on the UC system. One of the presenters used to be on UCLA’s admissions committee. He told us that the UC schools have become very good at getting around the AA ban in California, and he’s actually sued the system to expose these methods. He also explained that when Prop. 209 first became law, the numbers of African Americans and Hispanics admitted to the best UCs was extremely low. I think he said only one African American was accepted into Boalt Hall after Prop. 209 became law. Since then, the numbers have gone up because the decision makers are getting around the ban, at least according to this speaker who claimed to have first hand knowledge.</p>