Hacker News Reader

Comment by one2know | Hacker News Reader

Tech human resources, legal, and recruiting are overwhelmingly white women, to wit no one cares. Truck drivers are 94% men, no one complains about that. The business and political community is hyperfocused on software engineering jobs for two reasons. Corporations want political support for H1-B. And, in some cases, STEM workers have high importance in influencing the political world as we saw with Facebook in the 2016 elections. Therefore, the political world is hyper-focused on those specific jobs to hire people that they think are sympathetic to their political parties, usually along race and gender lines.

View on HN

Completely agree, though i'll also add that journalists want a cudgel to beat tech with for a variety of reasons, and diversity is the favored cudgel du jour to beat everyone with.

In my opinion is a very strange that HR is overwhelmingly female. It seems to me that many companies consider HR to be just administrative bureaucracy. Yet talent development and organizational psychology have been pioneered by male researchers and psychologists.

HR are administrative bureaucracy. They are neither expected nor trained to do anything with organizational psychology. Nor have power to change organization.

They do know some psychology, but more of tactical "how to calm this person right now".

Is that not just because women were not really involved in the field back then?

As recently as during the Spanish flu female nurses were an oddity.

nurses, teachers, HR and many more professions are overwhelmingly female dominated, yet nobody is complaining about that, is it? why does gender and race matter when what it takes is skills, competence, intelligence? why is it so hard to understand that univariate analysis is nonsense?

Actually, the discussion around nurses/teachers being overly female and how it impacts the salaries in the field is widely discussed in sociology and feminist theory. The idea that professions dedicated to "care" (healthcare, childcare, or even human ressources which demand "people skills") are overwhelmingly female and underrated is a staple of a lot of conversations around gender, workforce and income gaps between men and women.

edit : corrected a typo

The idea that those professions are lower-paid because they are mostly female is pretty strange. It would require a vast and secret conspiracy. The scandal would dwarf the secret Silicon Valley agreement (involving Apple, Google, Adobe, Intel) by many orders of magnitude.

You can make a reasonable argument that the causation goes the other way, with men giving higher priority to money when choosing a career. This makes sense, because a male's career has a huge impact on dating success.

> It would require a vast and secret conspiracy.

This conspiracy theory has been given a name, which is widely use in feminist circles: the Patriarchy.

It used to be routine to openly pay women less than men merely because they were women. No vast conspiracy was required then, so why would it be now?

Things have changed in the last few decades. Every company would just hire women to save money if it was so simple.

The reality is that there are many factors that determine how much you are individually paid. Two people of the same gender, role and title can have vastly different compensation because of negotiations.

> Not only did competition not end discrimination, there was enough discrimination that the act of not discriminating provided a significant competitive advantage for Townsend-Greenspan. And this is in finance, which is known for being cutthroat. And not just any part of finance, but one where it's PhD economists hiring other PhD economists. This is one of the industries where the people doing the hiring are the most likely to be familiar with both the theoretical models and the empirical research showing that discrimination opens up market opportunities by suppressing wages of some groups. But even that wasn't enough to equalize wages between men and women when Greenspan took over Townsend-Greenspan in 1958 and it still wasn't enough when Greenspan left to become chairman of the Fed in 1987. That's the thing about discrimination. When it's part of a deep-seated belief, it's hard for people to tell that they're discriminating.

> In tech, some people are concerned that increasing diversity will "lower the bar", but in sports, which has a more competitive hiring market than tech, we saw the opposite, increasing diversity raised the level instead of lowering it because it means hiring people on their qualifications instead of on what they look like. I don't disagree with people who say that it would be absurd for tech companies to leave money on the table by not hiring qualified minorities. But this is exactly what we saw in the sports we looked at, where that's even more absurd due to the relative ease of quantifying performance. And yet, for decades, teams left huge amounts of money on the table by favoring white players (and, in the case of hockey, non-French Canadian players) who were, quite simply, less qualified than their peers. The world is an absurd place.

https://danluu.com/tech-discrimination/

"diversity raised the level instead of lowering it because it means hiring people on their qualifications instead of on what they look like"

It would be absolutely wonderful if everything was a meritocracy like this, and it's what most people ask for.

Unfortunately in the tech industries and modern media, "diversity" initiatives are the exact opposite and only want people based on what they look like.

Why didn't every company in every industry hire women to save money 50 years ago? You seem to be begging the question at issue by simply assuming that sexism doesn't still exist now.

There weren't that many qualified. Education and career pipelines were different, training was different, expectations were different. Are you saying nothing has changed in 50 years?

Sexism exists (and perhaps it would be more productive if you stopped only believing in binary extremes) but it's not a widespread conspiracy. Did you skip the line about the same gender/title/role still being paid differently?

It's clearly illegal now, so that would be a good reason to keep it on the down low. I'm not saying there is a conspiracy, just that one might be useful here.

Hypercapitalism would make it unprofitable to not hire women if they consistently ask for lower wages the same way it is unprofitable to not hire chinese labor. People are just fungible resources, the cheaper the better.

I would bet that male nurses do pretty well with dating.

It's important not to forget there's alot of self-selection going on too.

> nurses, teachers, HR and many more professions are overwhelmingly female dominated, yet nobody is complaining about that, is it?

When is the last time you read a nursing magazine, or did a web search for information about increasing the numbers of male nurses?

People do complain about these things.

The difference is for some sectors this topic appears frequently on the mainstream media while what you suggest requires checking dedicated specialists publications or active intention of search. That is precisely the problem, what determines the difference in which sectors’ diversity problems deserve most public attention and why.

The issue of the gender ratio in nursing does appear in the mainstream media too.

I'm sure there is an odd piece here and there. But certainly not covered as frequently and as prominently as tech. To give context, US has almost exactly the same number of software engineers and nurses (~4 million).

Evidence for this? Tech overall is in the news more than nursing, but there are many stories about male nurses in the mainstream media every year.

> People do complain about these things.

But how do they complain? Compared to the tech situation, where you don't dare think it might be anything but sexism and oppression.

Here's an article in the Guardian about the topic.

https://www.theguardian.com/healthcare-network/2017/mar/01/w...

Some choice excerpts:

“Nursing is all about the empathy and caring that people show, but those traits are not exclusively female [..]”

Let's see, "Tech is all about logic, but those traits are not exclusively male".

“Men might find it harder to put into words their caring and compassionate qualities, but can demonstrate them more easily.”

-> "Women find it harder to express their technical chops, but they can demonstrate them more easily"

"When I was a ward manager, or sister, I did get some people saying: “Shouldn’t you be a brother?” But, actually, no one has ever commented on the fact that I’m a matron and a man."

-> Tech language is sexist and must be changed.

"Davies questions whether it is the work itself that doesn’t attract men, or whether other factors are to blame"

-> If you even dare to suggest that something other than horrible sexism is to blame for the imbalance in tech, no matter the overwhelming evidence, you are censured or fired.

Lack of male teachers was discussed ever since I was a kid. Just because you don't care about that topic does not mean it does not exists. The guy teachers were supposed to be role models for boys.

Sure but it’s not like there cannot be both more female truck drivers AND tech leaders. As tech is one of the wealthiest and critical industries in our society currently, it is natural the spotlight is fixed here.

That said, the focus should be on equality of opportunity, and not outcome. So, yes, we should encourage more women to study and do well in tech but force-fitting jobs is unfair and creates bad incentives.

> As tech is one of the wealthiest and critical industries in our society currently, it is natural the spotlight is fixed here.

Which is essentially "we want to be equal when it comes to the good things and unequal when it comes to the bad things". I'm sure there are plenty of people who want to be equal to professionals who work 70 hour weeks when pay day comes around, but they don't want to be equal when it's time to work.

> I'm sure there are plenty of people who want to be equal to professionals who work 70 hour weeks when pay day comes around, but they don't want to be equal when it's time to work.

Are you saying that the likelihood of slacking off is higher for certain groups than others? I doubt what you say is 100% proven or even probable but that said the likelihood of this happening is equal across all groups

> Are you saying that the likelihood of slacking off is higher for certain groups than others?

No, and I have no idea how you can misread my comment to mean that. What I'm saying is that most people don't want to work 70 hours a week. But most people would very much like the pay that you get from working 70 hours a week. If you allow them to choose both sides individually, I'm pretty sure they'd choose the low input and high output.

Ok, right, my mistake. My point was about improving diversity through equal opportunities. Not sure how that applies to what I said. It is a different issue altogether no?

> Truck drivers are 94% men, no one complains about that.

Used to work at Uber Freight. There were definitely conversations around safety for women drivers or a lack thereof. Just wanted to point out that this statement is a little presumptuous especially if the author is not involved in the industry. Just because you're not exposed to it doesn't mean there aren't complaints. There's a documentary called Big Rig and it showcases the lives of truck drivers, some of them are women. They go into depth about the dangers of being on the road as a women, go watch it, you'll quickly realize some people do care.

How is that related to the balance of men vs women and racial demographics in the trucking industry? Aren't the men also facing many dangers in that profession?

It's expected that men work in more dangerous professions, they're after all, bigger and stronger than women.

Yes, men and women are different, and choose to do different things as well (on average). That's why a 50/50 ratio in every industry is a nonsensical goal.

Also, software is seen as a great and growing middle class job now. No one wants to be left out. Truckers, not so much.

I really think it's this. Tech jobs are seen as the remaining 'good' jobs while automation and technology eats away at everything. So it is I imagine reasonable that the public at large wants the share of these economic opportunities to be diverse, like the population that the tech companies themselves serve.

> Corporations want political support for H1-B.

There's one problem with this theory. H1-Bs overwhelmingly go to Indians. I don't think there's anyone campaigning for increasing the participation of Indians or Asians in general in tech.

> (other jobs...) to wit no one cares

> The business and political community is hyperfocused on software engineering jobs for two reasons. Corporations want political support for H1-B. And, in some cases, STEM workers have high importance in influencing the political world

Are you saying that this is manufactured, a "liberal agenda", or something else?

Diversity fosters an environment with less marginalization and discrimination.

I could be wrong, but I think women in tech want more women in tech, and candidates from diverse backgrounds want more diversity.

>"Diversity fosters an environment with less marginalization and discrimination."

I'm not too sure about that. I think the likelihood of discrimination is probably the same when you have a "diverse" group compared to a relatively homogenous group. What matters is whether there are jerks in either group.

I've been on teams where I was the only white guy and everyone else was Indian and we all got along great, and I've been on teams with lots of different "identities" represented and people did not get along.

Why do you think diversity is just as likely to breed discrimination than an homogenous group? People not getting along on a personal level is definitely different than marginalization/discrimination patterns.

If the team is more diverse, someone is more likely to point out when discrimination/prejudice is involved, as there is a higher chance someone will be sensible to the specific type of discrimination involved. Nobody can have a universal perspective on things, and someone from a different background might percieve something you will be unaware of.

Most common marginalization/discrimination patterns can't be addressed by simply saying "there's a discrimination happening here!"

For example, one of the canonical inclusion problems for women is that many people perceive their aggressive behavior more negatively. Hiring more women won't help, because women are equally susceptible to the bias. And calling it out on the spot won't help, because how can you know when other people are improperly forming negative opinions?

Reply on news.ycombinator.com