11 ms·

To be more charitable to the commenter's point, that's not what's being asserted as discriminatory. They're making the claim that it's implicitly discriminatory

To be more charitable to the commenter's point, that's not what's being asserted as discriminatory. They're making the claim that it's implicitly discriminatory to penalize people who don't spend time on programming outside of work, because that reasonably penalizes people who are older (i.e. more likely to have a family). They are not making the claim that choosing to hire someone better than someone else is discriminatory.

boring_twenties 7y ago
Why is it discriminatory? All else equal, isn't it clearly better to hire someone with no responsibilities outside of work, than someone who has to be out of the office at 5pm every day to deal with their kids?
- ghaff 7y ago
  >isn't it clearly better to hire someone with no responsibilities outside of work Umm. No? I see nothing "clearly better" about someone just because they don't have any responsibilities.
  - boring_twenties 7y ago
    Really. You don't see anything better about hiring someone for whom the job will be their #1 priority, and someone else for whom it will be #2 or even lower? I find that difficult to believe.
    - riversflow 7y ago
      How do you know here that their job will be priority #1? Traditionally, men with families are considered more reliable because having a family demands stability. If I’m a dude who gets sucked into code, who’s to say I won’t get sucked into some other code than what I’m getting paid for.
      - perl4ever 7y ago
        Also, if you have a family, you're a lot less likely to move to another state for a big raise if you're underpaid.
- LargeWu 7y ago
  The main reason that employers seem to think it would be "better" (for them) is so they can pressure said employees for free labor and overly-aggressive timelines.
  - boring_twenties 7y ago
    Yes, exactly? Why wouldn't I rather hire someone who is usually available at anytime vs. someone who needs to leave at 5pm every day, constantly taking days off to deal with issues with their kids or their school, constantly bringing germs into the office and so on?
    - ghaff 7y ago
      Toxic individuals like you should really find some other industry to pollute.
      - boring_twenties 7y ago
        So we have a personal attack, an unsubstantiated assumption, and zero substantive argument. And I'm the toxic individual? Perhaps you should find a different message board to pollute.
        ghaff 7y ago
        I should not have made a personal attack. But I really would encourage you to consider what others have written and think about why your take on hiring is not healthy and may even be actively discriminatory against a protected class.
        boring_twenties 7y ago
        You'll be happy to know I have nothing to do with hiring of any kind, but just as an individual contributor it seems quite unhealthy to me to work on a team where work is my #1 priority, but everyone else's distant second. I suspect you'd find it quite ridiculous to have to pick up my slack as I have to run at 5pm to practice with my bandmates, at least if you weren't paid correspondingly more for the extra effort. Change that to a PTA meeting or soccer practice, though, and suddenly it's how dare you suggest that I get paid less for not only doing less work than you, but doing some of the work I was expected to in the first place!
- mitchty 7y ago
  > All else equal, isn't it clearly better to hire someone with no responsibilities outside of work, than someone who has to be out of the office at 5pm every day to deal with their kids? No it isn't clearly better. Note, I'm single but proposing that someone that lives code as being better than someone that stops to smell the roses of life is a bit too much. You're also discriminating for people that may be horrible for the team. I bet that person with kids is likely better at conflict resolution than the programmer that never goes out to socialize. That is what you're discriminating for/against. I'm learning a hobby on how to build some rather completely different things. Not only is it refreshing to think of computers as "just another goddamn tool" but to not need the things at all. It is letting me escape getting into a rut in software only. But guess what, it means I'm not contributing to open source because I'd rather be doing something, anything else. Working outside of work is mostly free training for your company. Nice for them, bad for you later on in life. I'd rather meet and make friends as I am growing older. Relationships are the thing I regret most for not paying better attention in life. I don't think as a society we should keep encouraging people to act like mindless drones.
  - boring_twenties 7y ago
    > someone that lives code > programmer that never goes out to socialize. I never said that someone has to live and breathe work, only that they don't have anything _higher priority_ than work. If I have social plans with my friends I'll likely cancel them if there's a bona fide work emergency. If I have family obligations I cannot and will not. > I'd rather meet and make friends OK, and I'd rather ski for an hour or two every weekday morning, then come home and shower and finally start working at noon. I just don't see why I would expect the work opportunities available to me, and the compensation, to be no less than someone who doesn't have that requirement. Having kids is a lifestyle choice that is at odds with other choices. If my preferred lifestyle is to be a starving artist/musician, or a ski bum, but I also want to have kids and so might have to suck it up and take a soul-sucking corporate job, no one is going to shed a tear for me. But if instead of rocking out I just want to get the same jobs and paid the same salaries as people who are actually much more productive than myself, that's somehow not only reasonable but unimpeachable. All it really is is another in a long line of examples of people with kids expecting special privileges and support for their personal lifestyle choices, not only from society at large (maybe reasonable) but from everyone, individually (not). If you want society to subsidize having children, then the government should do it, not individual software teams.
- playing_colours 7y ago
  It may be clearly better if all you need a bunch of young and fast code typists. What about ability to make balanced pragmatic decisions, not based on fun or hype? What about mature communications, understanding of business? Understanding of technical dept, complexity?
  - boring_twenties 7y ago
    This assumes that everyone over 30 or so is focused on family, which is obviously not the case.
    - playing_colours 7y ago
      Obviously not everyone. But many people review their priorities at this age. At the same time, you body and your mind start suffering from such dedicated lifestyle: back pain, depression. You also most likely reach your salary cap in 30s as a coder, so you'll get no ROI on coding more. Suddenly, physical activities, rest, communications, hobbies make more impact on your work performance. In the end, it's a matter of personal choice, and the choice is not black and white between work as a meaning of life and leisure skiing till lunch.
- Karrot_Kream 7y ago
  But all else is not equal, and this is what I find incredibly silly. You have a very strong prior on time when that is probably just one of many factors. Experience, efficiency, the ability to work well with others, organizational ability, and perspicacity are just a few of the several other things that goes into being an effective engineer. Moreover you don't seem to balance your time prior out with others. Sure, time may have an effect, but what if this effect is marginal? This also gets down to something that bothers me about this line of thinking, which is the desire to create overly simplistic models of talent. Talent is incredibly multi-faceted, and hiring based on pithy narratives without actually looking at data is how we ended up in this situation where class signalling or age has become a substitute for talent.

boring_twenties 7y ago

Why is it discriminatory? All else equal, isn't it clearly better to hire someone with no responsibilities outside of work, than someone who has to be out of the office at 5pm every day to deal with their kids?

ghaff 7y ago
>isn't it clearly better to hire someone with no responsibilities outside of work Umm. No? I see nothing "clearly better" about someone just because they don't have any responsibilities.
- boring_twenties 7y ago
  Really. You don't see anything better about hiring someone for whom the job will be their #1 priority, and someone else for whom it will be #2 or even lower? I find that difficult to believe.
  - riversflow 7y ago
    How do you know here that their job will be priority #1? Traditionally, men with families are considered more reliable because having a family demands stability. If I’m a dude who gets sucked into code, who’s to say I won’t get sucked into some other code than what I’m getting paid for.
    - perl4ever 7y ago
      Also, if you have a family, you're a lot less likely to move to another state for a big raise if you're underpaid.
LargeWu 7y ago
The main reason that employers seem to think it would be "better" (for them) is so they can pressure said employees for free labor and overly-aggressive timelines.
- boring_twenties 7y ago
  Yes, exactly? Why wouldn't I rather hire someone who is usually available at anytime vs. someone who needs to leave at 5pm every day, constantly taking days off to deal with issues with their kids or their school, constantly bringing germs into the office and so on?
  - ghaff 7y ago
    Toxic individuals like you should really find some other industry to pollute.
    - boring_twenties 7y ago
      So we have a personal attack, an unsubstantiated assumption, and zero substantive argument. And I'm the toxic individual? Perhaps you should find a different message board to pollute.
      - ghaff 7y ago
        I should not have made a personal attack. But I really would encourage you to consider what others have written and think about why your take on hiring is not healthy and may even be actively discriminatory against a protected class.
        boring_twenties 7y ago
        You'll be happy to know I have nothing to do with hiring of any kind, but just as an individual contributor it seems quite unhealthy to me to work on a team where work is my #1 priority, but everyone else's distant second. I suspect you'd find it quite ridiculous to have to pick up my slack as I have to run at 5pm to practice with my bandmates, at least if you weren't paid correspondingly more for the extra effort. Change that to a PTA meeting or soccer practice, though, and suddenly it's how dare you suggest that I get paid less for not only doing less work than you, but doing some of the work I was expected to in the first place!
mitchty 7y ago
> All else equal, isn't it clearly better to hire someone with no responsibilities outside of work, than someone who has to be out of the office at 5pm every day to deal with their kids? No it isn't clearly better. Note, I'm single but proposing that someone that lives code as being better than someone that stops to smell the roses of life is a bit too much. You're also discriminating for people that may be horrible for the team. I bet that person with kids is likely better at conflict resolution than the programmer that never goes out to socialize. That is what you're discriminating for/against. I'm learning a hobby on how to build some rather completely different things. Not only is it refreshing to think of computers as "just another goddamn tool" but to not need the things at all. It is letting me escape getting into a rut in software only. But guess what, it means I'm not contributing to open source because I'd rather be doing something, anything else. Working outside of work is mostly free training for your company. Nice for them, bad for you later on in life. I'd rather meet and make friends as I am growing older. Relationships are the thing I regret most for not paying better attention in life. I don't think as a society we should keep encouraging people to act like mindless drones.
- boring_twenties 7y ago
  > someone that lives code > programmer that never goes out to socialize. I never said that someone has to live and breathe work, only that they don't have anything _higher priority_ than work. If I have social plans with my friends I'll likely cancel them if there's a bona fide work emergency. If I have family obligations I cannot and will not. > I'd rather meet and make friends OK, and I'd rather ski for an hour or two every weekday morning, then come home and shower and finally start working at noon. I just don't see why I would expect the work opportunities available to me, and the compensation, to be no less than someone who doesn't have that requirement. Having kids is a lifestyle choice that is at odds with other choices. If my preferred lifestyle is to be a starving artist/musician, or a ski bum, but I also want to have kids and so might have to suck it up and take a soul-sucking corporate job, no one is going to shed a tear for me. But if instead of rocking out I just want to get the same jobs and paid the same salaries as people who are actually much more productive than myself, that's somehow not only reasonable but unimpeachable. All it really is is another in a long line of examples of people with kids expecting special privileges and support for their personal lifestyle choices, not only from society at large (maybe reasonable) but from everyone, individually (not). If you want society to subsidize having children, then the government should do it, not individual software teams.
playing_colours 7y ago
It may be clearly better if all you need a bunch of young and fast code typists. What about ability to make balanced pragmatic decisions, not based on fun or hype? What about mature communications, understanding of business? Understanding of technical dept, complexity?
- boring_twenties 7y ago
  This assumes that everyone over 30 or so is focused on family, which is obviously not the case.
  - playing_colours 7y ago
    Obviously not everyone. But many people review their priorities at this age. At the same time, you body and your mind start suffering from such dedicated lifestyle: back pain, depression. You also most likely reach your salary cap in 30s as a coder, so you'll get no ROI on coding more. Suddenly, physical activities, rest, communications, hobbies make more impact on your work performance. In the end, it's a matter of personal choice, and the choice is not black and white between work as a meaning of life and leisure skiing till lunch.
Karrot_Kream 7y ago
But all else is not equal, and this is what I find incredibly silly. You have a very strong prior on time when that is probably just one of many factors. Experience, efficiency, the ability to work well with others, organizational ability, and perspicacity are just a few of the several other things that goes into being an effective engineer. Moreover you don't seem to balance your time prior out with others. Sure, time may have an effect, but what if this effect is marginal? This also gets down to something that bothers me about this line of thinking, which is the desire to create overly simplistic models of talent. Talent is incredibly multi-faceted, and hiring based on pithy narratives without actually looking at data is how we ended up in this situation where class signalling or age has become a substitute for talent.