
Apple makes slight progress on diversity while rivals make practically none - clifanatic
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-switch/wp/2016/08/03/apple-makes-slight-progress-on-diversity-while-its-rivals-are-making-practically-none/
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vgoh1
The nation is somewhere around 12℅ black, and a little over 50℅ female. Am I
the only one that just doesn't see a problem with Apple being 9℅ black and 37℅
female? That is not close enough? Will people only be satisfied when companies
_exactly_ match the demographics of the countries they operate in? There are
many more white, Asian, and Indian males that graduate with tech degrees, so
Apple is to ignore this when hiring? It's not Apples fault that there are
fewer minorities and women graduating with STEM degrees. America is so damn
race obsessed.

~~~
eridius
No, it's not close enough. You're acting like the low representation in tech
companies is strictly because there are a lot more male white/asian/indian
candidates, but that's not correct. A big reason why there are a lot fewer
candidates from other demographics is in a large part _because of_ the low
representation. Lack of representation both means lack of role models, and it
also serves as a big signal that someone in an underrepresented demographic is
going to have a hard time succeeding in that industry. It also means that
people of underrepresented groups who go into the industry anyway are not
going to find very many people like themselves, which will make them less
comfortable (which leads to fewer people going into the industry in the first
place).

On a different note, why did you use ℅ instead of %? ℅ is U+2105 CARE OF, but
you used it like a percentage.

~~~
kofejnik
"A big reason why there are a lot fewer candidates from other demographics is
in a large part because of the low representation."

Can you back this with a peer-reviewed study? Or this is one of things we are
supposed to take for self-evident?

~~~
eridius
Have you ever actually tried _talking_ to people in underrepresented groups?
Asking for a peer-reviewed study for something that over 50% of the world
experiences in their personal lives is just a tactic for shutting down the
conversation.

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zeveb
I honestly don't understand why any corporation would spend money on anything
other than chasing the absolute best candidates, regardless of race, gender or
anything other than their excellence with respect to their positions.

Every minute spent caring about diversity is a minute not spent caring about
excellence; every dollar spent chasing diversity is a dollar not spent chasing
excellence. Hire the best candidates, no matter who they are.

I don't care about someone's race or gender, so long as he is the best
possible candidate for the position. And if he's not, why would I want him?

~~~
JauntTrooper
But what if some of the best candidates aren't getting hired because the
system that created the applicant pool is skewed/biased and leads to under-
representation of talented candidates?

Isn't it be perfectly reasonable for a company to try to correct that bias in
order to ensure they're hiring the best people?

It would be great if gender/race/age bias didn't exist in hiring, but there's
a lot of evidence that it does. The good diversity programs acknowledge the
problem and aim to fix it in order to get the best talent.

~~~
internaut
Blind hiring tests can be done.

Oddly enough there is no drive for it.

Curious, that.

~~~
Dylan16807
Because it's harder to do and people think they're better at judging
candidates with more info than they actually are.

Not very curious, that.

~~~
internaut
I agree with the second proposition but don't see why it should be harder to
accomplish. It appears to be largely a matter of requesting some information
through a channel that does not permit nonessential observation, like a Turing
Test or rather the original Victorian game, a reversed Imitation Game.

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bballer
The act of selecting one candidate for a job over another based on their
ethnicity or gender instead of their qualifications and aptitude is literally
the definition of racism/sexism. By doing so they are propagating the very
thing they claim to want to destroy.

This obsession with balance of race and gender is toxic to what actually makes
businesses great, talent.

~~~
maxxxxx
That's starting to bother me too. Shy people, short men, disabled people,
people who stutter, fat people, ugly people are also being discriminated
against. It's certainly a well-intended effort but the "diversity" trend
creates a few groups of favored people while doing nothing for others that are
also being discriminated against.

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masonic
I'm not at all surprised that they are _completely mute_ on age diversity.

~~~
SamReidHughes
Neither am I, because in a growing industry with your HQ being in a location
receiving a migration influx, it's not a useful stat.

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ebola1717
I'd emphasize the "slight." Apple fares no better when it comes to diversity
in management, and in fact, unlike their peers, doesn't even have a sizable
number of Asian people in management.

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whack
Are there any diversity advocates that fault the NFL/NBA for their severe
under-representation of Latinos and Asians?

If the low number of Blacks/Latinos at Facebook is proof that FB is unfairly
discriminating against them, then why can't the exact same argument be made
regarding the lack of Latinos/Asians in the NFL and NBA?

Stereotypes and prejudice is real, and I'm all for efforts made to combat
them. I'm very optimistic about the potential for "blind interviews," similar
to orchestra's blind auditions, in order to combat the influence of
stereotypes during the interview process. But the idea that someone can just
put together a pie chart of Facebook employee demographics, and use that as
proof that FB is any worse than your average American company, is just
nonsense and lazy thinking.

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mhuffman
This is such an absurd fucking argument for people to have.

BTW, Apple is based in Cupertino, which has 0.6% Black population, 63.1%
Asian, and 29.3% White -- even if you take a huge surrounding area, it is
about the same.

Shouldn't they hire to match the demographics?

How about the state demographics? They would need a lot more hispanics!

How about the world demographics? They would need a lot more Asians!

Why stop at matching gender and race?

Why not match the population of red-headed people that are qualified? Are they
not normally discriminated against enough?

How about fat or old people? Plenty of them and those motherfuckers wake up
discriminated against!

How about ugly people? I have been to Apple headquarters and can vouch they
are low on ugly people compared to the general population. Are ugly people not
discriminated against enough?

How about hire who is best qualified? That is a fucking idea! Almost like if
you had a fiduciary duty to do what is best for your company, and hiring the
best qualified employees is exactly that!

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boguslogic
You don't need a role model that has the same skin colour as you to be
motivated to do stem or specifically get into programming. Stop caring about
what people look like. stop trying to control how the industry hires because
that's not the problem. People don't do programming or science because it's
hard. Most people that go to university don't even improve or add to the field
they studied. Let people choose for themself what they want to do and stop
worrying about things that don't matter. Nobody is crying about the lack of
diversity in nursing or finance or social work or whatever it is kids choose
to study these days.

~~~
eridius
> _You don 't need a role model that has the same skin colour as you to be
> motivated to do stem or specifically get into programming. Stop caring about
> what people look like._

You _seriously_ underestimate how important it is to see other people like
yourself succeeding at the things you're considering. I also find it pretty
interesting that you created a new account for the express purpose of making
this comment. I don't know if that's because you don't want me figuring out
what race/gender you are, or because you _know_ you're making a boneheaded
comment and don't want it to be visible on your main account.

~~~
internaut
He is doing it because witchhunts are a thing.

~~~
eridius
You could say that about almost _any_ comment, and yet you don't see people
constantly creating brand new HN accounts to make comments (in fact, brand new
accounts are often viewed with suspicion). Besides, their comment wasn't
anything overly inflammatory, it was actually a point of view that a
surprising number of people tend to express, it just happens to be completely
wrong.

~~~
hyperdunc
Their view contains the moral high ground, whereas yours might seem pragmatic
but actually reinforces identity politics.

~~~
eridius
Moral high ground? That's bullshit. Their view is "I'm privileged as fuck and
have no idea what other people are going through, therefore I want to
completely discount their issues and pretend they don't exist while at the
same time blaming them for it". There's nothing even remotely moral about
that.

