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Countries with more gender equality have fewer female STEM grads

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Re: Countries with more gender equality have fewer female STEM grads

#241

Post by depressedpanda »

tptacek wrote: post #141

This is on the front page of Hacker News because people here believe it bolsters arguments about the underlying fairness of our field, in which women make up something like 20% of the workforce. The article does not accomplish that. Despite an overall trend in STEM throughout the western world for greater male participation than female, computer science is uniquely low ; it is rivaled only by physics and MechE for ge…

> Despite an overall trend in STEM throughout the western world for greater male participation than female, computer science is uniquely low; it is rivaled only by physics and MechE for gender disparity.

So, basically you're saying that the more technical a field is, the less women will be inclined to pursue a career in it?

Aside from your tiresome bias coming from obvious ideology, I actually agree with you.

Re: Countries with more gender equality have fewer female STEM grads

#242

Post by geofft »

ghostcluster wrote: post #215
neaanopri wrote: post #196

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure, one standard deviation makes the ratio like 63% to 37%? That's not what we see in tech job ratios, it's worse than that. Everything past that is unjust and deserves effort to rectify

That's just at the mean. It skews even more once you start heading toward the tails, the high end of which you would expect to see in the engineering labor force.

How many standard deviations past the mean do you need to be to work in STEM?

One way to bound this is to look at the number of people in STEM careers. 6.2% of US jobs were in STEM in 2015 (https://www.bls.gov/spotlight/2017/science-technology-engine...), meaning that STEM employment requires at most being just under 2 standard deviations above the mean—and that only if you assume that society optimizes perfectly to fill all of those careers with the people most suited to them in terms of base biological aptitude. Once you throw in other factors like location and access to education, it probably gets significantly lower than that.

Would you say that all your coworkers at all STEM jobs you've been at have been at least one standard deviation above the mean at aptitude for the job?

Re: Countries with more gender equality have fewer female STEM grads

#243

Post by lulmerchant »

hyperdunc wrote: post #225
aspaceman wrote: post #209

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is a horribly un-empathetic position to take that ignores most women's testimonials. Reading the accounts of women in tech who have been forced out would not lead me to believe that they just aren't that interested. They are systematically encouraged to get out, and do something else with their lives. Being so skeptical of these opinions because they're in the minority, rather than evaluating their actual merit…

I've no doubt certain individuals have been given a hard time, as in the accounts you've read. But I don't believe for a second that women "are systematically encouraged to get out, and do something else with their lives."

The exact opposite is true. With all the pressure on diversity numbers, talented female engineers are very highly sought after.

The truth is it doesn't matter what the data says. There's an entire political philosophy that's based on everybody being either oppressed, or an oppressor. For people who subscribe to that, they will always claim that invisible forces are at work oppressing people, no matter how much reality proves otherwise, and they will never offer any proof to support these claims, because it's just so axiomatic to them.

Re: Countries with more gender equality have fewer female STEM grads

#244

Post by depressedpanda »

Aaron1011 wrote: post #194
lulmerchant wrote: post #185

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'll ignore the irrelevant marxist talking point and trump references, and redirect you back to the data. The Nordic countries always lead in these stats. These are the countries that are the most egalitarian in the world, where 3rd wave feminism forms a major part of social policy, where women have an equal level of opportunity to men and the freedom to choose their own paths in life. The data shows that under these…

> I'll ignore the irrelevant marxist talking point Which part of the parent comment was a "marxist talking point"?

Wow, good job focusing on minute details instead of addressing the overall point your parent is making.

However, I'll indulge you and hazard a guess:

* The historically naive and somewhat incorrect generalization of some ill-defined "Western" culture (what time frame is he using?) * the negative portrayal of it * and the implicit assumption that any part of the portrayal is somehow unique to all Western countries, but not the rest of the world.

I will give you that this criticism of "Western culture" probably doesn't really relate to traditional Marxism, which more or less worked within the framework of Western culture.

I believe your parent might have had the concept of "cultural Marxism" in mind.

Re: Countries with more gender equality have fewer female STEM grads

#245

Post by oh_sigh »

bluewave wrote: post #84
cazum wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Arguing that women naturally prefer non-STEM fields is sexist While I agree with the entirety of your comment, I don't see how this is the case. If the physical differences between human groups cause one to prefer something over the other, how is it disparaging to attempt to validate this hypothesis?

Because it's false if you consider the entire human population. You can argue that women in US & Europe prefer non-STEM fields but generalizing to all of women is logically false because of numbers in China and other developing countries with large populations.

Isn't that partially because those women are forced, through circumstances, to enter those fields even though they'd rather not?

Re: Countries with more gender equality have fewer female STEM grads

#246

Post by redwood »

rayiner wrote: post #151

How do you define which countries have “more gender equality?” It seems like begging the question. My family immigrated from Bangladesh to America. In most ways, obviously, America is a lot more equal. But my mom and her sisters have STEM degrees, and that wasn’t all that unusual for a wealthy Bangladeshi family at the time. Bangladeshis perceive STEM as important, and encourage both girls and boys to pursue it (even…

In developing countries where women (and men frankly) study STEM in higher numbers it's likely that those women come from elite families (considering the vast majority of population in these countries do not have a chance to pursue higher ed). As a result we're looking at a an elite microcosm that is, by virtue of its own access to education and enthusiasm for remaining (recognizing fierce competition) in the elite tier of an otherwise incredibly gendered society.

Re: Countries with more gender equality have fewer female STEM grads

#247

Post by kenning »

platz wrote: post #198
kenning wrote: post #177

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> (e.g. bricklayers vs nurses) How about doctors vs nurses? I think this is a much more relevant comparison. In the united states (sorry) male doctors outnumber female by about 2:1 [1], while female nurses outnumber male nurses by more than 10:1 [2]. Comparing these two professions it's a lot easier to make the argument that women are implicitly encouraged to set their expectations lower than men, who actually may fe…

> you're confused as to why women choose 'difficult' jobs less often so, all those high-power, highly-paid, female lawyers are likely to have just breezed right though?

US lawyers are 64% men, 36% women https://www.americanbar.org/content/dam/aba/marketing/women/... The numbers get worse as the position's status gets higher.

Why did you even post this acerbic and wrong reply that ignored the whole point of what I was saying?

Re: Countries with more gender equality have fewer female STEM grads

#248

Post by depressedpanda »

geofft wrote: post #238
mpweiher wrote: post #203

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For studies like these, it actually helps to look at the data rather than just skim the headlines/talkimg points, which tend to cherry pick to support the narrative. For example, when "left due to unfair treatment" is unpacked by group, white women are the lowest percentage! (28% vs. 38% for white/asian men).

Yes, that's true. Again this is the percentage thing I mentioned—the study is not claiming that more white and Asian men leave because of unfair treatment than women, it's claiming that of those who leave , more white and Asian men report unfair treatment as a motivation than women do.

So this study shows that unfair treatment is a less important reason for women leaving tech than it is for Asian and white men.

Why, then, are other people commenting here claiming that bad treatment of women is the main reason they leave tech, and at alarming numbers, no less?

Re: Countries with more gender equality have fewer female STEM grads

#249

Post by andrewprock »

overcast wrote: post #44

I'll probably face wrath, and hell's fury for this, but maybe, men and women are different. Has forcing STEM upon the female population, driven any more of them towards the discipline? Taking the sampling size of every woman I've ever went on a date with in my 37 years, none of them were interested in anything related. The vast majority were teachers, psychologists, and nurses. Occupations based around nurturing othe…

It's certainly been the case that the participation of women in medicine and law, both peripheral to STEM, has increased significantly over the last 50 years.

Re: Countries with more gender equality have fewer female STEM grads

#250

Post by mpweiher »

geofft wrote: post #238
mpweiher wrote: post #203

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For studies like these, it actually helps to look at the data rather than just skim the headlines/talkimg points, which tend to cherry pick to support the narrative. For example, when "left due to unfair treatment" is unpacked by group, white women are the lowest percentage! (28% vs. 38% for white/asian men).

Yes, that's true. Again this is the percentage thing I mentioned—the study is not claiming that more white and Asian men leave because of unfair treatment than women, it's claiming that of those who leave , more white and Asian men report unfair treatment as a motivation than women do.

Right, and it seems that those relative percentages are the relevant figures, which might also be why they were reported.
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