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There's a fundamental problem, that we're all having a tough time navigating. That is-- various subgroups have a much lower rate of participation in advanced s

by mlyle 4y ago

There's a fundamental problem, that we're all having a tough time navigating. That is-- various subgroups have a much lower rate of participation in advanced sectors of the economy. Some of this is almost certainly related to discrimination and lingering aftereffects of past discrimination. * Naively picking who appears most capable, especially based on metrics that are strongly influenced by class, may instead just be perpetuating these biases. Further, people who have had fewer resources dedicated to their development may have more opportunity for growth. * Conversely, trying to spread things out for equality-of-outcome and completely ignoring many measurements of ability is likely to be problematic, too, by not getting the strongest people in seats. In the end, allowing the entire pool of the population meaningful economic and cultural participation can be expected to bend up the arc of progress, but it is hard to figure out how to get there.

epicureanideal 4y ago
> Some of this is almost certainly related to discrimination and lingering aftereffects of past discrimination. Certainly possible. I think the divide between right and left on this issue is in their perception of how much this is the case. I’d be in favor of rigorous research on this topic. My own experience in the tech industry at many companies leads me to believe that if there is discrimination, it must be either historical or occurring earlier in the pipeline than tech company hiring. It’s been fairly consistent in my experience for thumbs to be put on the scales rather heavily to hire from historically disadvantaged groups, and clear bold statements have been made to exclude majority populations from interview pipelines that would be recognized as howling racism and sexism if applied to any other group. > Naively picking who appears most capable, especially based on metrics that are strongly influenced by class, may instead just be perpetuating these biases. It seems to me that we’re currently getting the worst of all possible worlds. The way we’re influencing the interview pipeline excludes low income people from the majority demographics and assists high income people from non majority demographics, with the overall effect of selecting for class above all else. I say all this as a kind person who wishes well for everyone and wants everyone to have the opportunity to self actualize to the best of their ability.
- quesera 4y ago
  These last few years have been the easiest times to get a job, or get funding, in the tech industry, in 20 years. And white and Asian males remain significantly advantaged over any other group, although the other groups don't seem to be as disadvantaged as they were 20 years ago. If that is not your experience, we must live in different worlds. Mine is SF/SV, with offices in other large cities in the US.
  - klipt 4y ago
    If you submit identical software engineer resumes, one with a typically white male name and one with a typically white female name, do you think one will get more interview opportunities? That seems like something that could be experimentally tested. My guess is the women's resume will get more interviews because tech companies really want to hire women software engineers.
    - mlyle 4y ago
      > one with a typically white male name The study you're mentioning has been done many times. The studies do tend to find that females do slightly better, but trivially so compared to the difference between typically white and black names. e.g. https://www.nber.org/system/files/working_papers/w9873/w9873.pdf https://www.nber.org/system/files/working_papers/w9873/w9873... The thing that this study found was that not only do blacks receive many fewer callbacks at baseline... they found that blacks' prospects improved less than whites' do when additional qualifications are added. That is, if you're black, you start as a disadvantage and you benefit less from efforts to improve your employability.
      - klipt 4y ago
        > That is, if you're black, you start as a disadvantage and you benefit less from efforts to improve your employability. Or, that the best thing to improve your employability is adopting a typically white female name?

by mlyle 4y ago

epicureanideal 4y ago

> Some of this is almost certainly related to discrimination and lingering aftereffects of past discrimination. Certainly possible. I think the divide between right and left on this issue is in their perception of how much this is the case. I’d be in favor of rigorous research on this topic. My own experience in the tech industry at many companies leads me to believe that if there is discrimination, it must be either historical or occurring earlier in the pipeline than tech company hiring. It’s been fairly consistent in my experience for thumbs to be put on the scales rather heavily to hire from historically disadvantaged groups, and clear bold statements have been made to exclude majority populations from interview pipelines that would be recognized as howling racism and sexism if applied to any other group. > Naively picking who appears most capable, especially based on metrics that are strongly influenced by class, may instead just be perpetuating these biases. It seems to me that we’re currently getting the worst of all possible worlds. The way we’re influencing the interview pipeline excludes low income people from the majority demographics and assists high income people from non majority demographics, with the overall effect of selecting for class above all else. I say all this as a kind person who wishes well for everyone and wants everyone to have the opportunity to self actualize to the best of their ability.

quesera 4y ago
These last few years have been the easiest times to get a job, or get funding, in the tech industry, in 20 years. And white and Asian males remain significantly advantaged over any other group, although the other groups don't seem to be as disadvantaged as they were 20 years ago. If that is not your experience, we must live in different worlds. Mine is SF/SV, with offices in other large cities in the US.
- klipt 4y ago
  If you submit identical software engineer resumes, one with a typically white male name and one with a typically white female name, do you think one will get more interview opportunities? That seems like something that could be experimentally tested. My guess is the women's resume will get more interviews because tech companies really want to hire women software engineers.
  - mlyle 4y ago
    > one with a typically white male name The study you're mentioning has been done many times. The studies do tend to find that females do slightly better, but trivially so compared to the difference between typically white and black names. e.g. https://www.nber.org/system/files/working_papers/w9873/w9873.pdf https://www.nber.org/system/files/working_papers/w9873/w9873... The thing that this study found was that not only do blacks receive many fewer callbacks at baseline... they found that blacks' prospects improved less than whites' do when additional qualifications are added. That is, if you're black, you start as a disadvantage and you benefit less from efforts to improve your employability.
    - klipt 4y ago
      > That is, if you're black, you start as a disadvantage and you benefit less from efforts to improve your employability. Or, that the best thing to improve your employability is adopting a typically white female name?