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Comment by KaiserPro | Hacker News Reader

indeed, the thing that struck me was how much of a middle class sausage factory SV-tech is.

I had worked in VFX/media for a long time, and we at least knew that we were mostly rich middle class fops. Having heard all the noise about how upset the tech bros were when diversity increased at FAANG, when I got here I expected to have some, well diversity.

I went from a team that had 8/30 female-male, which the company felt was too small, to a team inside FAANG which is all male. Every. fucking. team that I've been in contact, bar one, is an entire sausage factory.

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The problem is further upstream. This is the people who graduate. This is the people who enrol. This is the people who fall in love with computers.

At some point, we lose everyone else, and I wish I knew why. I have theories sure, but I don't actually know why.

Some years back I hiked the Inca Trail in Peru. The second day started with a long trek up the side of a mountain, covering a vertical distance of about 1500 m in about 4 hours. You could see the trail ahead pretty much the whole time, including the people on it. It was incredibly challenging to keep going as you were exhausted by altitude and effort and could see it was only going to get more difficult as the day progressed, and still you could see the people who were already on the trail ahead of you. This was the point where many hikers turned back.

What I learned was challenges that defeat you are never what's behind you, only what's in front of you. When it's an uphill climb, the people at the top are causing more of a challenge than what you left or even where you are.

I frequently encounter the position that "we shouldn't do anything at my level because the problem is further down the system" just like the parent comment says. Yes, it makes you feel better to deny you're part of the problem. Unfortunately it's not true in a way that makes the problem worse. It's a close cousin to "she shouldn't have dressed like that" or "she shouldn't have gone out alone". Or maybe "I was just following orders".

What if it was a hike that got less steep toward the top? The lesson you learned would completely fall apart.

I don't think you can apply a blanket logic to this. It's possible for problems to be all over, or clustered near the start or middle or end. It depends on the actual scenario.

It seems quite likely that being pushed out as a child is the biggest problem, and that's not because the kids are peering forward to look at job specifics, it's because of harmful stereotypes about boys vs. girls.

I don't know, I think it's worth trying to at least understand where the challenge lies. Maybe it is some linear progression where every person starts out with the same motivation to be a developer, and faces increasingly more hurdles till they either choose something else or succeed. Or maybe it's pretty easy to get to a certain point, but then there's some filter hurdle like toxic workplaces or university experiences that changes things. Or maybe some people just naturally have more interest in other things.

The better we understand the situation, the better we can allocate resources to address any inequities that do exist.

The problem with tackling diversity at the hiring level is that there's a finite supply of candidates. If you a proportional number of each group, you'll still end up with a large number of white men. What then?

> It's a close cousin to "she shouldn't have dressed like that" or "she shouldn't have gone out alone". Or maybe "I was just following orders".

I really struggle to see how.

yes, that is a problem, one we can't fix directly.

But, with apprenticeships we can grab them before they get put off by a-levels. (this again is UK specific). This means we can skip a layer off loss and get much better candidates in the process. (A lot of CS degrees are highly suspect...)

The reason why is right in plain sight: because most women aren't actually interested in tech jobs. And before you start fuming and downvote me, go look at Scandinavian countries (countries that have the most gender equality in the world) and look at the gender disparities in tech/nursing/schoolteacher jobs. It's not the 50/50 utopian vision you think it is.

> because most women aren't actually interested in tech jobs

Why? Is it written in their genes, or is it something we discourage them from? Is it perhaps something else?

I'm not asking for 50/50, I'm asking for equal opportunity.

At the moment its not equal. There are many societal issues that affect this. They even still affect Sweden et al.

I'm not asking for controversial things, like quotas, I'm just asking for companies to use the training schemes they have to get local talent thats representative of the cohort taking up CS subjects at 16.

Currently, having a 50:1 ratio is not anything like good enough. especially as its something like 25:75 split at 16

Not middle class. That include plumbers, mechanics, and other skilled technicians that really do have to work hard for their living.

SV is stuffed full of upper-middle-class, a category that is more different than the name would imply. These folks (including me) had the luxury of “not knowing what I want to do in college” (or even attending college in the first place) and getting to bounce around until we find something that sticks. Or go to medical/law/graduate school and take on hundreds of thousands of dollars of debt then work a free internship or residency before being able to command a salary that pays off that debt.

It’s a different world from the middle class.

Sorry I should have been more specific.

In the UK developers are overwhelmingly middle-middle class. If you were privately educated then you are much more likely to be on the business side. There are "lower middleclass" developers, but its much more rare in bigger businesses something like 20/80 split. (not as rare as women though..)

In the UK, the "trades" are seen as working class-lower middle class. Which is why the education system didn't bother catering to any kind of practical skill for trades. because Karen didn't want little Andrew to learn a trade.

Whats interesting is that yes, in the US its far more rarefied/isolationist.

> getting to bounce around until we find something that sticks

This is an under-appreciated dividing line between the somewhat-rich and the somewhat-poor. Being able to choose a career that you can stick with and even be passionate about will put you in a much better situation 20+ years later than having to take the first work that comes along out of sheer necessity (often repeatedly and employers get more skeptical each time). Many people never escape that trap; even those that do find themselves many years behind their age-peers financially.

Maybe referring to people by genitalia as their primary characteristic is part of the problem?

So you're male working in tech complaining about males working in tech?

Did you step aside to make way for a female hire?

I'm struggling to understand your point here.

Are you saying that there aren't enough jobs to go around? because that's patently not the case.

We need more engineers, to do that we need to train them. Instead of overfishing the standard places, we need to look elsewhere. If you want a purely business case, it cheaper to hire women, they are more loyal and don't ask for payrises[1]. not only that training in the UK is effectively free.

if you want a moral case: I want my daughter to work in my role (or what it evolves into.) at the moment she's going to have a shit time

[1]gross over simplification here.

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