In 2019, there were only 13 PhDs in CS granted to African Americans in the U.S. [pdf] | Hacker News Reader

In 2019, there were only 13 PhDs in CS granted to African Americans in the U.S. [pdf]

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37 pointscamillomiller25 comments

According to Census Bureau (2019)[1], this is the racial/ethnic makeup of the US:

    White                                       60.4%
    Hispanic and Latino Americans (of any race) 18.3%
    Black or African American                   13.4%
    Asian                                       5.9%
    Native Americans and Alaska Natives         1.3%
    Native Hawaiians and Other Pacific Islander 0.2%
    Two or more races 2.7%

Below is the normalized 2019 CS Ph.D. count for what you'd expect if the US was 100% of each respective race/ethnicity:

    White                          608
    Hispanic...                    115
    Black or African/American      97
    Asian                          2,560
    Native Americans/Alaska Native 153
    Native Hawaiian/Pac Islander   500

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Race_and_ethnicity_in_the_Unit...

This is terrible. More black people are struck by lightning, than earn a CS Phd?

"over the last 30 years (1989-2018) the U.S. has averaged 43 reported lightning fatalities per year. Only about 10% of people who are struck by lightning are killed, leaving 90% with various degrees of disability"

https://www.weather.gov/safety/lightning-odds

13.2% of the US population is black. https://www.census.gov/quickfacts/fact/table/US/IPE120218

So expected is about 6 black people killed by lighting, and 60 struck/year vs 13 who graduate with CS Phd if these stats are correct.

And the Nonresident Aliens get 906 more times PHDs than native hawaian (also twice as many as all of US ethnicities combined)

Statistics could mean a lot of things and can be spun a lot of ways.

Ethnicity stats can be seen at page 6.

These don't seem ethnicity stats at all. These are "two or three groups we have problems with" plus the rest of humanity divided in "white" and "Asians".

using the word 'granted' is an odd phrasing here

How so? The terminology is centuries old.

See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Academic_degree , which mentions things like "The Archbishop of Canterbury's right to grant degrees is derived from Peter's Pence Act of 1533 which empowered the Archbishop to grant dispensations previously granted by the Pope")

Or https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Professional_degree#History_of... - "The M.B. or Bachelor of Medicine was the first medical degree to be granted in the United States and Canada."

Or for a university, http://catalog.yale.edu/gsas/degree-granting-departments-pro... - "Degree-Granting Departments and Programs".

    Nonresident Alien             906 61.7%
    Amer Indian or Alaska Native    2  0.1%
    Asian                         151 10.3%
    Black or African-American      13  0.9%
    Native Hawaiian/Pac Islander    1  0.1%
    White                         365 24.9%
    Multiracial, not Hispanic       9  0.6%
    Hispanic, any race             21  1.4%

And only 21 of hispanic background? That's low, too. Also, "Non-resident Alien" could include all manner of race/ethnicity. Does it break anything down beyond that?

And? In 2020 America there is ample opportunity for anyone to attempt a CS Phd. I am a proponent of equality of opportunity, not of outcome.

This stat is clear evidence that there is not equality of opportunity.

Disparity of outcome does not prove disparity of opportunity.

Could you explain the logic that get you to that conclusion?

Everytime somebody has tried to argue that to me, it turns out that they believe that there are racial differences that are not based on evidence.

For example, I once had somebody say that the racial outcome differences were not like socioeconomic upbringing differences in outcome, and that though socioeconomic outcome differences were evidence of difference in opportunity, that racial differences were genetic, which is clearly abiological.

So if you are not positing racial differences in opportunity, what are you positing as the explanatory variable?

If it was all socioeconomics, you could see that in the data. You would control for parent's income and/or education, and you would see disparity disappear.

I don't know what is the primary cause of disparities but i wouldn't assume it's all socioeconomics without evidence.

Maybe different groups are valuing things differently? For example, an Indian may try to migrate to US using PHD as a gateway. So they may be more willing to sacrifice and work hard. Or maybe for some groups PHD (or education in general) brings more prestige compared to others.

My point is that socioeconomic differences resulting in different outcomes would be accepted as evidence of differences of opportunity. Because there's ample evidence of opportunities being different when growing up with fewer resources and more stresses.

There's also ample evidence of racial discrimination resulting in differences of opportunity, in all fields of science. But people are quick to assume that it doesn't exist, or are quick to point out any chance that it may even exist.

If a group has "fewer resources and more stresses" "when growing up", we should try to address that directly.

This doesn't mean universities doesn't present equal opportunity.

The reason someone is not as capable may be just bad luck (bad parents etc.). But still, society should give positions to most capable ones.

I would point out that the original claim was "equal opportunity," not merely "universities presenting equal opportunity."

And I agree that we should fix the systemic racism that causes unequal opportunity starting from early in in life.

And if we are to believe the stories that come from Black people that attempt degrees in CS, or STEM in general, they also face significant differences in opportunity at the university level as well. I'm inclined to believe these stories, as everytime I have spent some time investigating they have been true.

A PhD in CS is the final result of a long series of opportunities which certain groups may/may not have equitable access to. e.g. an affordable undergraduate education, resources to support students throughout undergrad, a good high school/elementary/pre-k education, and so on.

True that - it shows brutal discrimination against all US citizens since foreigners get twice as many PhD's as all of US combined /s.

Getting PHD is grueling low paid work with insane hours and very distant payoff. You become phd if you are idealist or have nothing better to do. It is possible that with all of diversity initiatives in big tech some potential phd get siphoned off after college - at least FAANG offer livable wage compared to the 30K phd stipend.

There is infinite number of lines that go through a single data point.

That's not quite logical, because universities recruit heavily from international students. Many universities get much more funding from international students and use this to balance their books.

What is the population of the world versus the population of the US?

Universities don't collect tuition for STEM PhDs -- you either do research or TA and get a tuition waiver and a stipend. It doesn't make any difference to them whether you're from the U.S. or overseas.

The real reason why the stats are so skewed towards foreigners is that the basic trade of the PhD is a lot more favorable if you don't have the alternative of just taking your bachelor's and going to work in the U.S.

Students may not pay for the tuition directly, as a matter of course, but all the universities I'm familiar with still collect tuition, from grants of the students' advisors, etc.

On the undergrad side, the universities are making so much money from foreign students because they're charging them rack rate, whereas most U.S. students get some form of financial aid from the university. If you replaced a U.S. student with a foreign student, the university is going to have to tighten its belt.

For grad students, the tuition waiver costs the same amount regardless of where the student is from. Assuming you could fill the ranks with (presumably less qualified overall) U.S. students, and the same amount of grant money was available, it doesn't make any difference.

The income math on doing a CS PhD if you already have a bachelor's I think fairly strongly argues against it. The salary differential for a PhD just doesn't make up for losing out on six years of high paying work. The major exceptions are (right now) an ML PhD, which is highly sought after. Also, if you want to do government/defense work, the PhD is very useful.

On the other hand, if you are a foreigner, it's pretty hard to break into the U.S. IT job market. H1Bs are scarce. If you can get accepted into a U.S. PhD program though, you get a well recognized credential, and you get a year of OPT and it's easier to get an H1B after that (or at least it was -- I know a lot of this is changing). You also get six years to improve your English. Even if you return to your home country, the U.S. PhD is likely to open many doors.

Groundbreaking idea there. Why has noone ever before thought of just giving everybody the same opportunities?

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