Public policy: Affirmative action, social equity, and employment patterns in Michigan's construction industry, 1966-1997

Bowers, H J (2000) Public policy: Affirmative action, social equity, and employment patterns in Michigan's construction industry, 1966-1997. DPA thesis, Western Michigan University, USA.

Abstract

Affirmative action public policy did not experience much debate when it was put in place during the late 1960's. However, the debate is occurring in the 1990s. Its merits are being weighed and there are movements locally to eliminate affirmative action policy. The Michigan construction industry, the focus of this study. This study examined not only these employment outcome benefits, but also outlines the outcome benefit trends over thirty-one years for national employment and employment in the state of Michigan with an emphasis on the construction industry. Details regarding white-collar and blue-collar occupational grouping trends as well as unemployment level trends are reviewed at the state of Michigan level were reviewed. Eight interruption dates were initially identified for this study (1971, 1975, 1977, 1980, 1989, 1991, 1992, and 1995), and a ninth interruption was added after initial analysis of data for the year 1981. Employment data for the years 1968, 1972, 1974, 1976, and 1977 were not analyzed. A regression and time series were used to analyze the data for trends regarding employment at the national and state of Michigan percentage levels and the unemployment percentage level in Michigan for each protected group. A P-value of .05 or less was interpreted as being a significant interruption in the series. Analysis of the data indicated that each protected group equally shared the P-value of .05 percent or less and there was not significance as a result of affirmative action public policy in the employment of black protected groups compared with other protected groups over the time of this study. Qualitative data were collected through the secondary source of archival documents. Qualitative results support the findings of the quantitative results.

Item Type: Thesis (Doctoral)
Uncontrolled Keywords: employment; policy; public policy; time series
Index terms: time series, movement, documents, unemployment, public policy, employment, construction industry
Subjects: public policy, data science, economic analysis, health behaviours and lifestyles, industry analysis, management, professional development
Topics: Governance, Business Strategy, Research Practice, Information Management, Human Resources
Descriptive scope: 3 PCT

N.B. Descriptive scope is a count of how many of the five facets of empirical research are indicated by the words used in title, abstract and keywords. It is not intended as a judgement on the research; merely a count of the kind of word we would expect to indicate Phenomenon, Concepts, Theoretical framing, Empirical techniques, Analytical techniques. If all five are present, then a code of “5 PCTEA” will indicate this. If you feel the coding for this record is questionable, we welcome discussion around the terms we matched or the way we categorized them. The facet you would expect may not be coded, or a facet may be coded inappropriately. This can also bear on a larger question, of which facets should be treated as defining in construction management research. Please get in touch, and we will look at it. More details here