A Minority With No Benefits

This week Lockheed Martin agreed to pay about $29.5 million to settle federal claims that it shortchanged white employees on pay, and the company denies the allegations and admits no liability. Meanwhile, the Census Bureau reports that non-Hispanic whites are just 32.5% of Californians, behind Hispanic residents at 41.2%. So I’m a minority in my own state. I checked the mailbox for the benefits package. Nothing. Not even a pamphlet.

I’m a husband, a father of three sons, a small business owner, and I’ve never asked anyone for a preference. I ran the 400-meter hurdles in high school and college, where every lane gets the same hurdles at the same height and nobody gets a head start. My argument is simple. White men in California are a numerical minority losing ground in the classroom and in hiring, and the law already promises them the same treatment as everyone else. We should enforce that promise, measure it, and fix the pipeline for boys before the gap hardens.

The pipeline problem starts in school. Women were 58% of U.S. undergraduates in fall 2021, and male enrollment fell 17% from fall 2010, against 13% for women. Among 25-to-34-year-olds, 52% of white women hold a bachelor’s degree, compared with only 42% of white men. Women lead in every major racial and ethnic group, too. The University of California admitted women at 54% and men at 42% of its California-resident first-year class for fall 2025. Campuses have built programs for many groups. I haven’t seen one built for the boy who would rather pick up a wrench than a syllabus. Pew’s survey backs the instinct: men without a degree were more likely than women to say they just didn’t want one.

Hiring is murkier, and I’ll say so. A 2025 online survey of 1,216 hiring managers at companies with DEI programs found 10% said their company avoids hiring white men. That is self-reported, from a job-site poll, so weigh it accordingly. Harder evidence is arriving in court. On Oct. 23, a federal judge in Florida let white male employees’ claims against Danaher Corp. proceed, finding that four plaintiffs plausibly alleged they were passed over for less-qualified candidates under its diverse-slate policy. That is an early ruling. Back to Lockheed: the government alleged that a 2021 “Compensation Adder” program gave the top 20% of employees in each business area an extra raise, and that HR staff pressured leaders to swap out nonminority employees initially selected for it.