Putting ‘diversity’ and ‘equity’ first nearly crashed the economy

Several years back, I asked what it wou🏅ld take to halt the diversity, inclusion, equity obsession in America.

What would it take to get back to excellence a🙈nd competence as the only criteria for employment?

Perhaps it would 🐓require the bridges to start falling down.

Though I suspect that if they did, then certain people would claim they’d only 🌱fallen because of “structural racism.”

Still, this week we had a good reminder of just how over-tolerant we have been of this insane, anti-excell🎉ence agenda.

Becaus🗹e although the bridges haven’t yet started to collapse, the bankಌs have.

And one reason is that the banks in question prioritized equity over excellenc🎀e.

The DIE agend🅷a constitutes an absolute obsession with exact representation (or preferably overrepresent🔥ation) of women at senior positions, including board positions in American companies.

This obsession with female representation is only an issue with hiඣgh-status jobs, of course.

Board seats, Hollywood star pay and so on.

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There is no movement that I am aw💮are of꧒ that is pushing for equal female representation among road-layers in America. Funny that.

But for at least 15 years, diverဣsity has been everything.

After the last financial crisis, in 2008, the then-head of✃ the International Monetary Fund came up with a cutesy line.

If Lehmann Brothers had been Lehmann Sisters, Christine Lagarde used 𒆙to claim, then perhaps the global financial crisis might not have hap🌠pened.

Well, that is a lot of balls, as the New York Post showe🎶d this week with the tale of Jay Ersapah.

Ersapah is a womanꦡ and held the role of head of risk management at 🅠SVB.

But if Ersapah spent any time trying to manage🤪 risks, I don’t know how she did it because h🌳er more full-time job seemed to be to promote woke nonsense inside SVB.

For instance, as The Post revealed, Ersapah spearheaded such initiatives as🌜 a month-long Pride campaign, a blog emphasizing mental health awareness for LGBTQ+ youth and was co🥂-chair of the SVB European LGBTQIA+ Employee Resource Group.

At such shindigs, Ersapah would talk about what it was like to be “a queer person of color and a🃏 first-generation immigrant from a working-class ba🎶ckground.”

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By th𒊎e standards of our day, Ersapah is an absolu✨te winner.

A winner of the intersectional grievance stud෴ies search for the most oppressed person.

The ethic of our day dicta🍸tes that such a person not only has a right to any and every position, but that their very being there will bring untold (and unspecified) benefits to the company.

Well, what a shame 🌳that the one thing Ersapah can’t identify as is “competent.”

If she were competent, she might have been better at what should have been her ꦺmain role — which was to manage ris🎉k.

Something which she a🅠nd the bank as a whole werಌe clearly inept at.

Not least because SVB was lending long and borrowing short — an unbelievably ele🧜mentary error that banks have been studiously avoiding since the savings and loans crisis of⛦ the 1980s.

But look at the things that obsessed the top brass at SVB a🐼nd you can see that their eyes were on other balls🍸.

Amoꦿng the failed bank’s board, only one 𝓡member had a career in investment banking.

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The other board members were mega-donors t♉o the Clintons and other top Democrats.

One was even an improv performer.

By modern standards the board did everything right. It had the right Democratic politics — clearly loathing half of the country. It even donated a staggeri💟ng $73 million 🐼to Black Lives Matter groups.

A𒈔nd this waജsn’t just some expensive tokenistic thing.

The bank’s own promotional materials stated that “SVB is committed to creating a more diverse, equitable, inclusive and accessible environment within SVB, within the innovation ecosystem, and in our co💎mmunities.

“At the heart of this commitment is our effort to foster a more inclusive culture and increase racial, ethnic and gender representation.”

The bank boasted that it wanted to use its resources to “break down systemic barꦬriers.🐬”

All very nice, and clearl🧸y all pretty disastrous.

Last time the global economy almost crashed was in part beca🗹use of banks making loans to people on 𝓀the basis — among other things — of their race.

But a responsible bank should not issue a loan solely b♌ecause of someone’s race, sex or sexu𒀰ality.

It should look simpl💝y and solely at whether the person can repay the loan — whether it is for 🎃a mortgage or a business.

Make a priority of anything el൲se, and you are not “managing risk.”

You are creating it.

That is what SVB and othe𓆏r banks have done with their insane emphasis on modish, woke investment policies.

So yes, for the time being, thౠe 🍌bridges are still holding.

The banks, however, are not.

And we should be asking how we can get this cou🤪ntry off a fixation that could bring the whole darn thing crashing down.