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Comment by tcfhgj | Hacker News Reader

> According to a 2009 study of Australian men, short guys make less money than their taller peers (about $500 a year per inch); are less likely to climb the corporate ladder (according to one survey, the average height of a male Fortune 500 CEO is six feet); and, for the cis and straight among us, have fewer romantic opportunities with women (a 2013 study conducted in the Netherlands found that women were taller than their male partners in just 7.5 percent of cases). I’m five six on a good day, and I’ve found that being short is great for flying economy class—and not much else.

Unbelievable :(

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> a 2013 study conducted in the Netherlands found that women were taller than their male partners in just 7.5 percent of cases

Isn't that entirely to be expected just because men are on average taller than women? As a very quick 'n dirty numerical check, if you pick pairs of numbers from two normal distributions with means that are 2 standard deviations apart, only in 7.8% of the cases will the number from the distribution with the lowest mean be larger than that from the other distribution. In real life male and female heights aren't exactly normally distributed with the same standard deviation and just a differing mean, but is the true expected number of such pairs really much higher than 7.5%, that the result is significant?

How did you calculate that? (7.8%)

Let's assume male heights are distributed according to a pdf p(x;μ,σ) for a given mean and standard deviation, and assume the female heights are identically distributed with a mean lower by two standard deviations p(x;μ-2σ,σ) (which seems to be reasonably accurate). For a given female height y, the odds a random man is smaller than her are given by the integral of p(x;μ,σ) where x goes from negative infinity to y. You then have to integrate this quantity where y ranges from negative infinity to positive infinity, with the measure p(y;μ-2σ,σ) dy.

It's easy to show this quantity is independent of either the mean or standard deviation, so I just numerically integrated it in Mathematica for a standard normal distribution, which again seems to be reasonably accurate for human heights.

>Short guys aren’t so much discriminated against as they are precluded from stuff: like dating certain taller people, or making your frosh-soph basketball team.

Another one in the hall of "writers who don't read their own articles," this was the sentence preceding the one about the wage gap.

Just because there's a gap doesn't mean someone is being discriminated against. Shorter men could have self esteem issues that cause them to perform a little worse or fight for salary a little worse.

I worked in sales for a decade. I was better than top 1% at it nationwide. I'm 6'4". Was that because people just love buying from a tall person, or was it because I felt comfortable walking up to anyone and everyone since I was taller than them?

If that were true, you'd have to explain how they got the self-esteem issues in the first place if there wasn't discrimination.

FWIW, I have known a lot of people in sales and it's not confidence that makes you good - that's just a stereotype - but the ability to make the other person feel like you have their interest in mind. Sure you have to be willing to approach someone but without the ability to establish a connection, the confidence would be misplaced. It also seems like anyone can train themselves out of cold call anxiety.

> (a 2013 study conducted in the Netherlands found that women were taller than their male partners in just 7.5 percent of cases)

Don't men also tend to prefer women who are shorter than them? I know I do personally (though my first two girlfriends were taller than me, go figure.)

But they have less cells that could become cancerous?

This. Short people live longer.

Anorexia ftw.

Could be a good investment if you do it while you're young

rhGH seems way better honestly.

I don’t think it gets the job done as reliably though.

Learn to play guitar! Ideally singing while strumming.

If you think it's unfair to make $500 per inch less for the same work, try making 12.5% less, per breast.

Until we solve the inter gender pay gap, I'm not really interest in the intra gender height gap.

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