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What percentage of HIGH PAY ENGINEERING jobs in google have comp sci degrees, that's the true comparison. And then there is bigger issue here. It's really the o

by osmala 9y ago

What percentage of HIGH PAY ENGINEERING jobs in google have comp sci degrees, that's the true comparison. And then there is bigger issue here. It's really the obsession about percentages of women in X position. Here's another percentage what percentage of women and men didn't waste a thought on how they looked in their teenage years because they where so obsessed on how computers worked? I believe it is both very small and men are over represented there, and they are over represented in high paying computer jobs.

kamaal 9y ago
>>Here's another percentage what percentage of women and men didn't waste a thought on how they looked in their teenage years because they where so obsessed on how computers worked? Most people are not in the job because they like create things or build things. They are there because they want a job and nothing more. And they want a job where (unit of money)/(unit of work) has a higher value. That means they have to either figure out a way to make more money or do less work, or both. Therefore the question of early interest or passion is meaningless to most people. So as far as they are concerned, it rarely matters how set of people of identity A got to it. They think regardless of that if set A got it, other sets should get it too. This also creates other problems. Set A is likely to do side projects, write programs and hacks out of personal interest. Other sets looking at job as a return/effort metric will likely see why they are expected to do anything all all apart from working 5 hrs a day between 9 - 5. The problem is merit is heavily at the side of A and other sets want the reward to not go with merit, but rather with participation itself.
- linkregister 9y ago
  I find it interesting that HN commenters frequently take it for granted that someone who tinkered with programming at an early age and do side projects is a better performer at work. I have never seen any multiple-data-point evidence presented to support it. Sure, various prominent entrepreneurs used computers as hobbyists (Gates, Zuckerberg), but does that apply to the typical programmer? We all encountered students in classes who didn't study yet completely grokked their mathematics and algorithms coursework. Why is it so hard to believe that those quick learners use their time effectively at work? Additionally, a multiplier to good engineering is strong communication and organizational skills; those can be enhanced through social recreational activity, and diminished by spending leisure time in solitude. I'm not claiming either method is better, and intuitively the passionate engineer should win, but we shouldn't take it for granted until we get some actual information. Edit: there seems to be some belief that I don't value experience. It is extremely important. We just shouldn't take it for granted that programming at home is as valuable as work experience.
  - kamaal 9y ago
    Its not necessarily starting early in programming. Its being in general being good at 'scoring marks' vs 'doing projects'. The former and latter take very different skill sets, and their returns too are often very different. If you are good at doing projects. Along the way you learn a lot of other very important life skills. Things like resourcefulness, persisting at things, immunity to failure, trying many times etc. And these come handy and are usable to to many things that actually matter in the real world. That is building things. These things are harder to gain at a later stage in life because expectations from one's life at that time are different and you have to worry more about monthly payments and putting food on the table. You don't have 10 - 15 years lying around to do what other programmers have done in their early years where it was cheap to that in terms of time. You are also discounting the accumulative effects of these things. After a while due to years of practice, early starters are likely to get very good at things in a far more disproportionate way than those who come later.
    - linkregister 9y ago
      Would participation in athletics or math competitions fulfill your requirements for early hard work and adversity? I do agree with your premise. I just don't see where you actually disagree with mine. I'm not discounting anything. I'm just saying that it shouldn't be a given that engineers who got into the field late are automatically less able. > early starters are likely to get very good at things in a far more disproportionate way than those who come later. We think that but it's not actually demonstrated. Entering a field at the age of 18 or 20 isn't actually late. Until we actually have evidence that people who programmed before college have better outcomes, we need to stop talking about it as if it's a known truth.
      - kamaal 9y ago
        >>Would participation in athletics or math competitions fulfill your requirements for early hard work and adversity? Yes, but in School and a little higher- math is about learning heuristics and ready made procedures to solve problems in algebra and plugging numbers in formulas to get answers. And that is one of the biggest reasons why Nerds go onto to do things like projects to bail from the what is largely a useless academic exercise that gives you nothing real at the end. Sports has a binary distribution, you either make the big league money or you don't. >>I'm just saying that it shouldn't be a given that engineers who got into the field late are automatically less able. They won't be treated as such. They will be evaluated on the same grounds as the long slog people. And that is precisely the problem. Somethings come only with time. >>Entering a field at the age of 18 or 20 isn't actually late. Its isn't late in absolute terms. But everything in the world is comparative. The world is essentially a stack ranking system. You can do anything at any age you want. But there are costs associated with starting late, and they are in comparison with people who are long there.
- zaptheimpaler 9y ago
  So true. People didn't give two shits about the nerds and the tiny useless portion of the world known as computing they occupied 20 years ago - back then it was less glamorous and less money involved. They scoffed at the morons who not only did computers at work but continued to think, write and do "work" after work! Now theres money involved everyone wants in! Now those same leeches demand to be given the same roles/money as those who worked much harder for it , because its so unfair that people who put have more experience and passion are rewarded while they are not!
  - sidlls 9y ago
    I don't know what's more funny (or sad): that you think engineers are no longer as looked down on or compensated at a lower rate than their "work" should otherwise merit or that you seem to have completely missed the part about "equal experience" in your haste to poohpooh them that desire equal treatment for it as inferior.
    - kamaal 9y ago
      >>that desire equal treatment for it as inferior. The kind of equality that you are aiming for is meaningless, it doesn't exist and attempts to create this have lead to far bigger problems than they have tried to solve. This is the equivalent of asking why we don't handover gold, silver and bronze medals to the people who came last in the race instead of the top 3. This isn't discrimination. The sheer concept of effort vs reward in human psychology is designed such that "Humans are unequal by merit of our actions" Also the fact that some people are better than others is here to stay and not just restricted to software. Most of us are not going to be Neil Armstrong or Richard Feynman. That's not discrimination. There is only equality of access and opportunity. Outcomes are not going to be equal.
    - zaptheimpaler 9y ago
      Thanks for the condescension sensei. I think your position is equal work experience should merit equal pay. You seem to have missed my point also - experience outside work also counts as experience. And millions of things besides experience determine your salary. So we should not be so quick to assume that 2 people with the same years of experience "should" merit equal pay - its obviously false. If all people with equal work experience are simply equal in the value they bring to the company then why do we conduct interviews or ask for resumes or anything? Lets just set everyone's salaries to "$100K + 10K * (years worked)" no?
watwut 9y ago
The teenage years are completely utterly irrelevant to this. They are super irrelevant to high tech positions and definitely anything related big data software. Video games are irrelevant too. Who play with dolls and who plays with action figures or cars is even moremember irrelevant. High paying computer jobs are not filled with nerds nor high funstional autistic while we ate at it too.
- Chris2048 9y ago
  > High paying computer jobs are not filled with nerds I beg to differ

by osmala 9y ago

kamaal 9y ago

>>Here's another percentage what percentage of women and men didn't waste a thought on how they looked in their teenage years because they where so obsessed on how computers worked? Most people are not in the job because they like create things or build things. They are there because they want a job and nothing more. And they want a job where (unit of money)/(unit of work) has a higher value. That means they have to either figure out a way to make more money or do less work, or both. Therefore the question of early interest or passion is meaningless to most people. So as far as they are concerned, it rarely matters how set of people of identity A got to it. They think regardless of that if set A got it, other sets should get it too. This also creates other problems. Set A is likely to do side projects, write programs and hacks out of personal interest. Other sets looking at job as a return/effort metric will likely see why they are expected to do anything all all apart from working 5 hrs a day between 9 - 5. The problem is merit is heavily at the side of A and other sets want the reward to not go with merit, but rather with participation itself.

linkregister 9y ago
I find it interesting that HN commenters frequently take it for granted that someone who tinkered with programming at an early age and do side projects is a better performer at work. I have never seen any multiple-data-point evidence presented to support it. Sure, various prominent entrepreneurs used computers as hobbyists (Gates, Zuckerberg), but does that apply to the typical programmer? We all encountered students in classes who didn't study yet completely grokked their mathematics and algorithms coursework. Why is it so hard to believe that those quick learners use their time effectively at work? Additionally, a multiplier to good engineering is strong communication and organizational skills; those can be enhanced through social recreational activity, and diminished by spending leisure time in solitude. I'm not claiming either method is better, and intuitively the passionate engineer should win, but we shouldn't take it for granted until we get some actual information. Edit: there seems to be some belief that I don't value experience. It is extremely important. We just shouldn't take it for granted that programming at home is as valuable as work experience.
- kamaal 9y ago
  Its not necessarily starting early in programming. Its being in general being good at 'scoring marks' vs 'doing projects'. The former and latter take very different skill sets, and their returns too are often very different. If you are good at doing projects. Along the way you learn a lot of other very important life skills. Things like resourcefulness, persisting at things, immunity to failure, trying many times etc. And these come handy and are usable to to many things that actually matter in the real world. That is building things. These things are harder to gain at a later stage in life because expectations from one's life at that time are different and you have to worry more about monthly payments and putting food on the table. You don't have 10 - 15 years lying around to do what other programmers have done in their early years where it was cheap to that in terms of time. You are also discounting the accumulative effects of these things. After a while due to years of practice, early starters are likely to get very good at things in a far more disproportionate way than those who come later.
  - linkregister 9y ago
    Would participation in athletics or math competitions fulfill your requirements for early hard work and adversity? I do agree with your premise. I just don't see where you actually disagree with mine. I'm not discounting anything. I'm just saying that it shouldn't be a given that engineers who got into the field late are automatically less able. > early starters are likely to get very good at things in a far more disproportionate way than those who come later. We think that but it's not actually demonstrated. Entering a field at the age of 18 or 20 isn't actually late. Until we actually have evidence that people who programmed before college have better outcomes, we need to stop talking about it as if it's a known truth.
    - kamaal 9y ago
      >>Would participation in athletics or math competitions fulfill your requirements for early hard work and adversity? Yes, but in School and a little higher- math is about learning heuristics and ready made procedures to solve problems in algebra and plugging numbers in formulas to get answers. And that is one of the biggest reasons why Nerds go onto to do things like projects to bail from the what is largely a useless academic exercise that gives you nothing real at the end. Sports has a binary distribution, you either make the big league money or you don't. >>I'm just saying that it shouldn't be a given that engineers who got into the field late are automatically less able. They won't be treated as such. They will be evaluated on the same grounds as the long slog people. And that is precisely the problem. Somethings come only with time. >>Entering a field at the age of 18 or 20 isn't actually late. Its isn't late in absolute terms. But everything in the world is comparative. The world is essentially a stack ranking system. You can do anything at any age you want. But there are costs associated with starting late, and they are in comparison with people who are long there.
zaptheimpaler 9y ago
So true. People didn't give two shits about the nerds and the tiny useless portion of the world known as computing they occupied 20 years ago - back then it was less glamorous and less money involved. They scoffed at the morons who not only did computers at work but continued to think, write and do "work" after work! Now theres money involved everyone wants in! Now those same leeches demand to be given the same roles/money as those who worked much harder for it , because its so unfair that people who put have more experience and passion are rewarded while they are not!
- sidlls 9y ago
  I don't know what's more funny (or sad): that you think engineers are no longer as looked down on or compensated at a lower rate than their "work" should otherwise merit or that you seem to have completely missed the part about "equal experience" in your haste to poohpooh them that desire equal treatment for it as inferior.
  - kamaal 9y ago
    >>that desire equal treatment for it as inferior. The kind of equality that you are aiming for is meaningless, it doesn't exist and attempts to create this have lead to far bigger problems than they have tried to solve. This is the equivalent of asking why we don't handover gold, silver and bronze medals to the people who came last in the race instead of the top 3. This isn't discrimination. The sheer concept of effort vs reward in human psychology is designed such that "Humans are unequal by merit of our actions" Also the fact that some people are better than others is here to stay and not just restricted to software. Most of us are not going to be Neil Armstrong or Richard Feynman. That's not discrimination. There is only equality of access and opportunity. Outcomes are not going to be equal.
  - zaptheimpaler 9y ago
    Thanks for the condescension sensei. I think your position is equal work experience should merit equal pay. You seem to have missed my point also - experience outside work also counts as experience. And millions of things besides experience determine your salary. So we should not be so quick to assume that 2 people with the same years of experience "should" merit equal pay - its obviously false. If all people with equal work experience are simply equal in the value they bring to the company then why do we conduct interviews or ask for resumes or anything? Lets just set everyone's salaries to "$100K + 10K * (years worked)" no?

watwut 9y ago

The teenage years are completely utterly irrelevant to this. They are super irrelevant to high tech positions and definitely anything related big data software. Video games are irrelevant too. Who play with dolls and who plays with action figures or cars is even moremember irrelevant. High paying computer jobs are not filled with nerds nor high funstional autistic while we ate at it too.

Chris2048 9y ago
> High paying computer jobs are not filled with nerds I beg to differ