As women have more equal opportunity, the more their preferences differ from men • Hacker News Board

Re: As women have more equal opportunity, the more their preferences differ from men

#491

Post by AnthonyMouse » Tue, Nov 06, 2018, 2:07 AM UTC

KirinDave wrote: post #394

AnthonyMouse wrote: post #339

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> An excellent example of this is how a 6-10% wage gap is considered an acceptable outcome of biological differences and choice, but a 10% average difference in primary education among young men is a crisis, with multiple think tanks suggesting society caters too much to young women and that being a young man is "a liability." You're comparing a difference in wages to a difference in population . The maximum range of…

> You're comparing a difference in wages to a difference in population. This is not actually correct (and in fact, I'm not talking about college and these numbers are not correct for college participation! ), but even if it were, we can formulate wage problems in terms of populations. > Moreover, if you want to see a large difference, what's with the gender balance in the prison population? And it's a popular argumen…

> This is not actually correct (and in fact, I'm not talking about college and these numbers are not correct for college participation!), but even if it were, we can formulate wage problems in terms of populations.

But then the numbers are completely different. If you look at something like gender balance at the 20th or 30th percentile income level for full time employees, there are more men at those below-median income levels than women. Then men are underrepresented around the middle, but women are highly underrepresented at the top. The people making millions or hundreds of millions a year bring the male average way up but that does nothing for the bottom 90+% of men who on average are actually making less than the average woman.

> This is just another example of my argument: it's a problem if there is a bad outcome for men. It's not a problem if there is a bad outcome for women, it's "choice."

The argument is that there should be consistency. If it's a problem in one case then it should be a problem in every case. We have laws against employer sex discrimination and a slew of programs to try to help women advance their careers. The wage gap is smaller now than it was 20 years ago, and smaller 20 years ago than it was 40 years ago. What analogous thing is actually being done to keep men out of prison? What progress has been made there?

You're also apparently claiming that going to prison is a choice in the same way that choosing a profession is. There is theoretically a choice whether to commit a crime or not, but in the Three Felonies a Day sense there isn't, and committing a crime is demonstrably not a prerequisite to going to prison anyway.

Re: As women have more equal opportunity, the more their preferences differ from men

#492

Post by fulafel » Tue, Nov 06, 2018, 5:46 AM UTC

toxik wrote: post #192

msh wrote: post #187

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't know that book, but it's wrong on childcare being less affordable. Atleast in Denmark and Sweden child care is heavily subsidized, to the point of being free for very low income parents (in dk). So there is no way it can make economic sense for mothers not to work. And stay at home moms (for more than 1-2 years) is rare compared to the USA.

You still pay the opportunity cost, even if you are getting a monthly income. Why should I hire the person who was away for a solid year on parental leave over the guy who has been working diligently during that time? Forcing parents to have equal amounts of parental leave, as we do in Sweden (well, we incentivized it,) is a form of imposed equality of outcome. Equality of outcome is often said to be some disease of…

> Why should I hire the person who was away for a solid year on parental leave over the guy who has been working diligently during that time?

I think all the other answers to this have been arguing either yes/no, but it's really the wrong question.

If you have 2 candidates, you should take into account their experience, but you shouldn't otherwise penalize the parental leave taker. So by taking parental year you put yourself one year back in the experience cohort.

There is nothing discriminatory or gender specific about this. If it turns out that women take more parental years than men, we return to your question of incentives and equality of outcomes, to be decided separately.

Re: As women have more equal opportunity, the more their preferences differ from men

#493

Post by engineeringwoke » Tue, Nov 06, 2018, 8:38 AM UTC

ummonk wrote: post #464

bacon_waffle wrote: post #420

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Parenthood can be planned - it isn't some random catastrophe that befalls you for which you need an insurance safety net. While you're obviously right that one can plan to become pregnant, that doesn't make unplanned pregnancies a non-issue. So, that safety net is beneficial.

Whether an unplanned pregnancy results in parenthood is a planned choice.

A couple in their early 30's just meet up after getting home from work. The wife, nervous, approaches her husband and says, "I have something to tell you". She pauses, taking in the moment, and him. "I'm pregnant".

Is that an easy moment for you? If she has an abortion, then chances are higher that she could never have a child again. It's not just a "choice". Christ.

Re: As women have more equal opportunity, the more their preferences differ from men

#494

Post by vidarh » Tue, Nov 06, 2018, 10:21 AM UTC

amanaplanacanal wrote: post #268

vidarh wrote: post #182

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People who believe this is solely cultural pressure should try having children. While, sure, you can raise children to be much more willing to challenge gender norms, and you can raise them to not hide or be ashamed of where their personal preferences violate cultural gender norms, every parent I've known that have strongly believed it was all cultural have ended up changing their mind after they've tried their harde…

I have no doubt that this is exactly what happens, but I don't think it shows what you intend it to show. Kids pick up the culture around them, and if they are exposed to television or other children, they are going to pick up what they see. I don't think this is necessarily a bad thing in and of itself, but I don't think it proves anything innate in gender either. Another part of the problem is our language, and the…

You'll see these kind of preferences long before kids have been exposed to much more than their parents, and even if their parents try to hard to avoid it.

Re: As women have more equal opportunity, the more their preferences differ from men

#495

Post by vidarh » Tue, Nov 06, 2018, 10:23 AM UTC

js8 wrote: post #185

vidarh wrote: post #174

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you don't want there to be anybody who got a bad deal in society, first you need to understand whether or not where they are now is where they want to be or somewhere they ended because other options were closed to them. If you don't know if they got a bad deal, you don't even know if there's anything to fix, much less how. But you can't just ask people that, because people make a whole lot of choices based on wha…

I believe people are grown up enough to tell me if they think something is wrong. So I don't see why simply asking is not enough. (I understand that some people don't want to complain directly in oppressive regime, so assuming that's not the case.) And in my opinion, society doesn't ask people enough what they want. I am a big fan of direct democracy, which is pretty much that - asking people what their preferences (…

They are grown up enough to tell you, but that does not mean that they're quantifiable as doing as well as others.

Re: As women have more equal opportunity, the more their preferences differ from men

#496

Post by repolfx » Tue, Nov 06, 2018, 10:26 AM UTC

KirinDave wrote: post #477

tomp wrote: post #384

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> An excellent example of this is how a 6-10% wage gap is considered an acceptable outcome of biological differences and choice, but a 10% average difference in primary education among young men is a crisis, with multiple think tanks suggesting society caters too much to young women and that being a young man is "a liability." That's just so wrong... (1) it's not that 10% wage gap is considered an acceptable outcome,…

(1) Young, talented people do this all the time. If your idea of how to dismiss this criticism is to suggest wage gaps themselves are fake and that somehow men are inherently more valuable to the workforce at an intrinsic level, you're going to have to do more than compare it to seniority-based compensation schemes. (2) Tom, to be crystal clear: I think both dismissals are equally bad things to do. My point is that p…

Jordan Peterson said it best: There is no wage gap. There is an earnings gap.

So, nobody is suggesting that wage gaps are fake. They're asserting it as undisputable fact. Find a place where men and women of equal experience, time at work and so on are being paid differently because of their gender and you have an easy lawsuit on your hands. In practice this doesn't happen because such discrimination doesn't happen.

Women nonetheless earn less because of choices they make, like choosing to work in HR instead of software engineering. This is not a crisis.

Re: (2) you seem to be cherry picking. It's been shown that female primary school school teachers are biased towards girls and some researchers have even started suggesting that this is partly responsible for increased female grades over time. Regardless, virtually nobody is claiming the total and absolute dominance of women in primary-age teaching is a crisis or a problem that needs solving. In fact it's trivial to find cases where men appear to be disadvantaged relative to women and there's absolute silence from the media, from politicians, etc.

Re: As women have more equal opportunity, the more their preferences differ from men

#497

Post by repolfx » Tue, Nov 06, 2018, 10:31 AM UTC

gammateam wrote: post #435

manfredo wrote: post #432

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This summarized my view as well. If you plot the share of women's majors over time, computing's decline coincides with an increase in medical and law school enrollment. If, say, a woman wanted to be a doctor or lawyer but knew society wouldn't respect women in these roles and chose computing instead, was that a good thing? I'd say no. I like to joke with people, there is an extremely simple way of solving the gender…

I'm all for facetious humor but this is a bad joke for this thread

It's not a joke or even a thought experiment. The Soviet Union basically did exactly that and had >50% female participation in CS courses.

Re: As women have more equal opportunity, the more their preferences differ from men

#498

Post by repolfx » Tue, Nov 06, 2018, 10:36 AM UTC

DoreenMichele wrote: post #116

js8 wrote: post #114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"the expressed preference may actually be something they loathe, but don't feel empowered to reject" But we can ask them, right? We can ask e.g. nurses and computer programmers whether or not they loathe the choice of their profession. If there is e.g. relatively more computer programmers loathing it than nurses then you have an evidence of culturally pushed preference (towards computer programming, in this case), re…

"Learned helplessness" is a thing. If people have been told their entire lives from birth that X is strictly Verboten and they can only answer Y to that question, they may literally be unable to tell you that. They may not really understand it themselves. It may be literally unspeakable and even unthinkable.

Is it a thing, or is it something made up by psychologists and social activists with an agenda?

It would appear to be unfalsifiable. If someone is sure they don't want X, and you're telling them they really do want X it's just that they've learned to be pathetic their whole life and now their entire thought process is inferior to yours, that seems not only like pseudo-science but actually a dangerously extreme belief.

Re: As women have more equal opportunity, the more their preferences differ from men

#499

Post by ionised » Tue, Nov 06, 2018, 11:12 AM UTC

Carlton87 wrote: post #282

js8 wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"It matters when you want to evaluate whether a group has gotten a bad deal in society." I am not sure why would I want to do that. As a leftist (being pro-equality), I don't really want there to be anybody who got a bad deal in society. But why should it matter which group are they part of? It seems chauvinistic to me.

I'm on the right and the sad news that you must digest is there isn't enough resources for all 7 billion people. That is a fact that will only get worse as we continue to add more. Most will suffer and there really isn't anything a leftist government can do about that other than bring everyone down to the same level of suffering.

> I'm on the right and the sad news that you must digest is there isn't enough resources for all 7 billion people.

Well this is simply not true.

I'm no fan of ballooning populations myself because I'm kind of a misanthrope but resource quanity is not the problem. There is more than enough to feed, clothe and house up to 15 billion people, just not at the same standard as the resource-guzzling United States.

The problem is logistics and political will. That's what we don't have to provide for 10+ billion people.

Re: As women have more equal opportunity, the more their preferences differ from men

#500

Post by C1sc0cat » Tue, Nov 06, 2018, 12:21 PM UTC

gspetr wrote: post #476

C1sc0cat wrote: post #366

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You could argue that women are less like to die young from risky activities and should be preferred. I know a director level guy who had to agree to give up his sports bike as a condition of promotion to director level. Even having less time off from sports activities - broken legs from five a side foot ball cost a surprising number of days off.

The risk of dying in your 30s in an accident is minuscule, while IIRC 87% of women have kids. Also, companies can get insurance on an employee death (although limited to X% of highest paid employees): https://dealbook.nytimes.com/2014/06/22/an-employee-dies-and... I might be wrong, but I don't think a company can get insurance on an employee getting pregnant.

But it is on an actuarial basis