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Hiring discrimination: a problem for men in female-dominated occupations

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Re: Hiring discrimination: a problem for men in female-dominated occupations

#461

It's interesting to me people make all sort of assertions about why men or women are dominant in an industry without anyway to falsify their hypothesis. I provide some data points having lived in several countries that may offer some insight. Draw your own conclusions. I got my undergrad degree in Iran (a relatively conservative society with an ultra-conservative even anti-women government), where the ratio of women…

It's because in poor and conservative countries women must choose a high paying job if they want to escape oppression and arranged marriage. However, the more egalitarian and wealthy a country is, the more women are free to choose which job they like most and they are not so interested in Engineering it seems. EDIT: Ha, looks like this is just a Jordan Peterson false claim. Women seem to be strongly represented in sc…

"It's interesting to me people make all sort of assertions about why men or women are dominant in an industry without anyway to falsify their hypothesis". You proceed to answer with a random unsourced assertion that seems to go against current sociological studies.

So I'll answer you with another unsourced hypothesis: you're a man, and you just justified your position in the industry by waving your hand and saying "they don't want it anyway!". They are not interested in engineering you say? Would you mind giving me an hypothesis off the top of your head as to why that is? I'm sure you'll have a very interesting assertion here aswell.

"Woman does not wish to turn aside from her higher work, which is itself the end of life, to devote herself to government, which exists only that this higher work may be done. Can she not do both? No!" -Lyman Abbott (1903)

Re: Hiring discrimination: a problem for men in female-dominated occupations

#462

It's interesting to me people make all sort of assertions about why men or women are dominant in an industry without anyway to falsify their hypothesis. I provide some data points having lived in several countries that may offer some insight. Draw your own conclusions. I got my undergrad degree in Iran (a relatively conservative society with an ultra-conservative even anti-women government), where the ratio of women…

It's because in poor and conservative countries women must choose a high paying job if they want to escape oppression and arranged marriage. However, the more egalitarian and wealthy a country is, the more women are free to choose which job they like most and they are not so interested in Engineering it seems. EDIT: Ha, looks like this is just a Jordan Peterson false claim. Women seem to be strongly represented in sc…

That's a guess, where's the validation?

Re: Hiring discrimination: a problem for men in female-dominated occupations

#463
post #184

There are very concerning patterns developing at the moment in the DEI space. DEI efforts, and often those leading them, are increasingly the most biased and close minded parts of the organization. Spreading selected stereotypes and often solving concerns about “discrimination” by being very biased and inequitable. For example at my last company a report showed that slightly fewer of a certain minority were promoted.…

I think DEI efforts can greatly vary. I know that we've worked really hard to ensure that we don't disadvantage anyone -- but it's harder than it sounds. DEI is often dealing in zero sum spaces. For example, most of the staff is white males. We try hard to hire the best person for the role, but we've instituted a policy where we mandate interviewing underrepresented groups. Not that we will hire them, but that we wil…

So are you suggesting that some poor people have the wrong interests on certain issues and they need to fix that? Which issues specifically?

I do agree that we should try to be inclusive on interviewing. It's always good to have more candidates to pick from, as long as the process doesn't last too long.

Re: Hiring discrimination: a problem for men in female-dominated occupations

#464
post #67

During my career, I've seen enough discrimination in the name of DEI as well. But what bothers me more is the ageism. The number of times an old person has been rejected from a job is too damn high. The reasons have always been "he may not work well with young people", "seniority complex", "he is over qualified" etc. Most of the times, they were more than qualified. I fear when I am into 40s or 50s, I will face the s…

I'm curious if the ageism bothers you more because you know that will impact you specifically or is there another reason?

I agree ageism is total crap, but so is all forms of discrimination - it just seems that we will all ending up aging whereas the other forms are limited to minority groups who probably get the double whammy of minority + age.

Re: Hiring discrimination: a problem for men in female-dominated occupations

#465
post #336

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think due to the massive influx of people into this profession, the median age is still pretty low, but I think this will stabilize, and the age pyramid will look more even. As good, productive people will get older, recruiters will realize that people don't go senile at 40.

Eh, it's been this way since at least the 90's. How long should anyone wait for clearly illegal behavior to start being not ok?

Well I don't see the benefit of being lied to over speaking the illegal truth.

Re: Hiring discrimination: a problem for men in female-dominated occupations

#466

Earlier quoted context omitted.

On the whole, the weaker the gender roles in society the lower women's representation are in STEM [1]. I'm nearly 30 and there was ample messaging to try and get girls into technology when I was in elementary school decades ago. I disagree that society is implanting ideas in girls that they're not capable of succeeding in tech. This is a disparity that persists despite ample efforts to try and encourage girls to go i…

> I disagree that society is implanting ideas in girls that they're not capable of succeeding in tech. Then why do you think girls are self selecting away from computer science? Unless you believe they are somehow biologically wired to enjoy tech less it has to be because they're receiving messaging that causes them to believe they will enjoy it less than other fields relative to boys, right? I guess from your link y…

Is it really hard to believe that, even without external bias or force, women might on average enjoy some things more or less than men? Your question is rooted in a gender-essentialist assumption that anything other than 50/50 representation has to be the result of some type of bias or external influence, and this is an assumption I do not share.

Re: Hiring discrimination: a problem for men in female-dominated occupations

#467

Throwaway. I'm happy to have more women in tech and hope it occurs or continues. However, virtually everyone recruiting in tech has observed some toxic diversity initiatives, I would venture. Some examples I have seen personally or one degree removed from me. - pressure on HMs to hire more women despite 95% of applicants being male - people in interview panels openly saying "but he's a white man" / "do we want to hir…

>people in interview panels openly saying "but he's a white man" / "do we want to hire more white men" etc. Isn't this illegal?

> Isn't this illegal?

Yes, but it's not actually enforced or prosecuted in these cases.

Re: Hiring discrimination: a problem for men in female-dominated occupations

#468

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hear hear. If your conception of diversity doesn't include viewpoint diversity, you are operating within a prejudicial, small-minded, small-hearted, and regressive framework. If you belive the most salient details about a person can be read from their appearance, you are a bigot. This cuts every which way, but many want to pretend it's not true for their own biases. This includes seeing someone with blue hair and a p…

Genuinely asking: Is there a limit as to viewpoint diversity that should be tolerated in perceptions of diversity? eg. Should viewpoint diversity be extended to welcoming "women shouldn't have the right to vote" or "black people are not human beings"? If so, how does one value an opinion and also the opinion that some opinions are worth less than others?

No post body was provided.

Re: Hiring discrimination: a problem for men in female-dominated occupations

#469
post #79
post #67

During my career, I've seen enough discrimination in the name of DEI as well. But what bothers me more is the ageism. The number of times an old person has been rejected from a job is too damn high. The reasons have always been "he may not work well with young people", "seniority complex", "he is over qualified" etc. Most of the times, they were more than qualified. I fear when I am into 40s or 50s, I will face the s…

After age 40 I did a coding bootcamp to change careers. Another guy in the camp was doing the same. We compared notes on interviews. One day he gets a call back from a recruiter and he put the recruiter on speaker phone. She told them they liked him but chose someone else because (drum roll) culture fit. He asked what she meant by that and she outright said: "The other person is younger. You're old." We were shocked…

I reckon that someone in their 40s or 50s could probably make enough to retire from recording interview rejections and suing for discrimination. I've heard it happen a couple times myself as a junior employee, and had to tell hiring managers that what they were saying was illegal.

Re: Hiring discrimination: a problem for men in female-dominated occupations

#470
My sense is that most responses here are only to the title of the submission (the actual article title is "Gender discrimination in hiring: An experimental reexamination of the Swedish case").

Skimming through said actual article, it looks like the "against men" hiring discrimination is ~completely driven by this:

"...In female-dominated occupations such as cleaner, childcare provider, preschool teacher, accounting clerk, and enrolled nurse, positive employer response rates were much higher for women than for men. This is in line with earlier findings in different countries..."

Which sure sounds to me like "employers try to fill low-status, low-pay, often-crappy female-dominated jobs with yet more females".

It takes a certain sort of mindset to react as if men were clearly the (sole) group being wronged by that.

(Or do millions of men quietly aspire to jobs cleaning up dirty toilets, dirty diapers, and dirty bedpans, and I'm just ignorant of their dreams?)

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