PwC is the latest company to succumb to new pressures posed by the Supreme Court’s decision to outlaw affirmative action.
The top accounting firm has reportedly cut some of its diversity initiatives in the US and removed barriers white scholarship applicants that previously couldn’t apply due to their racial identity.
The company said it was it was applying “rigour” to its diversity, equity and inclusion practices to reflect the new judicial landscape. Per the firm’s latest annual DEI report it cut its commitment to dedicate 40 per cent of its procurement spending to minority-owned suppliers.
As ESSENCE previously reported the Supreme Court ruled last year that the “[r]ace-conscious admissions programs at Harvard and the University of North Carolina are unconstitutional,” and both are in violation of the Equal Protection Clause.
“I think it’s definitely going to be a step backwards for the country,” Errol Pierre, author of The Way Up: Climbing the Corporate Mountain as a Professional of Color, predicted in a July 2023 interview with ESSENCE. “And I’ll give a couple of reasons why. “California banned affirmative action back in 1988, and that was through Proposition 209. And there’s been many studies that tracked the after effects of that in the state. Four things happened. One, underrepresented minorities, especially Black people, ended up attending lower quality schools.”
Outside of collegiate-related DEI divestment, the affirmative action ban is affecting minorities’ access to high-paying jobs at companies with challenged diversity practices. PwC, however, says that’s not the case for them.
“Our commitment to attract the most diverse and dynamic group of professionals hasn’t changed,” Yolanda Seals-Coffield, chief people officer of PwC US, told the Financial Times. “Our commitment to cultivating an environment where all our professionals can thrive hasn’t changed. How we get there may face a few hurdles that it didn’t a year ago.”