Cite as: 594 U. S. ____ (2021) 25 Opinion of the Court have noted, differences in employment, wealth, and education may make it virtually impossible for a State to devise rules that do not have some disparate impact. But under the dissent’s interpretation of §2, any “statistically significant” disparity—wherever that is in the statute—may be enough to take down even facially neutral voting rules with long pedigrees that reasonably pursue important state interests. Post, at 15, n. 4, 19–20, 32–33. 17 Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act provides vital protection against discriminatory voting rules, and no one suggests that discrimination in voting has been extirpated or that the threat has been eliminated. But §2 does not deprive the States of their authority to establish non-discriminatory voting rules, and that is precisely what the dissent’s radical interpretation would mean in practice. The dissent is correct that the Voting Rights Act exemplifies our country’s commitment to democracy, but there is nothing democratic about the dissent’s attempt to bring about a wholesale transfer of the authority to set voting rules from the States to the federal courts. —————— 17 We do not think §2 is so procrustean. Statistical significance may provide “evidence that something besides random error is at work,” Federal Judicial Center, Reference Manual on Scientific Evidence 252 (3d ed. 2011), but it does not necessarily determine causes, and as the dissent acknowledges, post, at 15, n. 4, it is not the be-all and end-all of disparate-impact analysis. See Federal Judicial Center, Reference Manual, at 252 (“[S]ignificant differences . . . are not evidence that [what is at work] is legally or practically important. Statisticians distinguish between statistical and practical significance to make the point. When practical significance is lacking—when the size of a disparity is negligible—there is no reason to worry about statistical significance”); ibid., n. 102 (citing authorities). Moreover, whatever might be “standard” in other contexts, post, at 15, n. 4, we have explained that VRA §2’s focus on equal “open[ness]” and equal “opportunity” does not impose a standard disparate-impact regime.