The issue is, a lot of problems have been nominally "fixed". But the black community on average has not caught up with the gaps created and re-enforced by these earlier systems. eg. They didn't get to participate as much as white peers in housing booms due to redlining, blockbusting, etc. So if you started out European-American in 1930 [random 20th century year], or having the same wages and being black in that same year, odds are pretty good descendants of the latter are doing poorer, due to multiple racist housing policies.
If they haven't caught up, that's presumably true as measured by several concrete metrics, correct? So the question still is: why target skin color (the correlated trait) instead of those metrics?
I'm not staking out a position here, I haven't made up my mind myself. I'm just pointing out that OP raised a valid point which you didn't really address.
