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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

#601

Post by kenjackson »

nradov wrote: post #594
kenjackson wrote: post #559

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> So are you suggesting that some poor people have the wrong interests on certain issues and they need to fix that? Which issues specifically? Here I meant that often times issues are raised specifically as race issues, when really you can make the issue more inclusive and get better traction. For example, Black Lives Matter. While I can understand wanting to make the focus on race, it is hard to get traction on that…

Should companies give hiring preferences to candidates who currently have a low income? Or who grew up in low income households? Or come from certain Zip codes? I agree we should provide people with greater opportunities, but as a practical matter what are you proposing that employers actually do ?

I don’t think employers should do any of the sort. I think employers should not discriminate in their hiring (based on race, gender, etc…) and be mindful that they’re not doing so.

One of the most important thing companies can do for DEI is pay their fair and expected tax burden.

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

#602

Post by kodah »

AlchemistCamp wrote: post #494
duxup wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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 entered the industry in my early 30s and remember getting a really helpful piece of advice from a meetup talk. Enthusiasm for learning and the technology is a counter for most of the ageism in interviews. It will stop people from assuming you're set in your ways, a curmudgeon, out of date, or anything on those lines. The "culture fit" excuse is a tough one, though. That framing can be used to unknowingly discrimina…

> The "culture fit" excuse is a tough one, though. That framing can be used to unknowingly discriminate in all kinds of ways.

Just an imo here, but anyone who talks about "culture" at a company broadly needs to be called out. 9/10 they are likely leveraging some form of discrimination. Culture cannot be mandated or even controlled in any succinct way that it causes you to use that as a logic branch.

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

#603

Post by nullc »

bell-cot wrote: post #545
idiotsecant wrote: post #485

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is pretty dismissive of the men who want to work in what you consider low status crappy jobs. There are plenty of men out there who expressly go to school with the goal of being an educator, for example. The discrimination those men face is very real. It's ok to admit that there are some areas society has decided men shouldn't work in. It doesn't diminish the struggles of anyone else

Yes and no. For instance - there's generally a big gap between "go to school with the goal of being an educator", and being a preschool teacher. At least in the U.S., the latter tends to offer far lower status, pay, job security, etc. than being (say) a 7th grade teacher. Between the low desirability, high turnover, and "we must fill the opening" nature of most bottom-end, female-dominated jobs, I'd guess that the an…

> who really want those jobs

And why is it, Mr. Anderson, that you appear to really want this job? Could it be that you're a pervert?

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

#604

Post by nullc »

bluGill wrote: post #424
FFRefresh wrote: post #384

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've also seen similar behavior on interview loops. I also would love for there to be fear of engaging in illegal discriminatory behavior for companies. However, as an individual person, the cost/benefit equation on whistleblowing just seems so so bad. It just doesn't seem worth it as an individual. If these illegal things are going to be pushed back against, it seems like it'll need to be a coordinated/collective ac…

Whistle blowing is legally protected. So if you do it keep a lawyer on hand so you can sue them latter when they retaliate.

That's a miserable way to live though.

There really are no winners in court except the lawyers.

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

#605

Post by kodah »

phlakaton wrote: post #477
throwaway0wha8h wrote: post #39

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…

No. Not I. But I will say this: > pressure on HMs to hire more women despite 95% of applicants being male is something I've done myself, not to hold anything against the applicants coming in but because HMs have a significant amount of control over the funnel of applications coming in. I want them hustling to encourage women, minorities, veterans, old-timers, re-inventors, people with nonstandard educational paths--p…

> I want them hustling to encourage women, minorities, veterans, old-timers, re-inventors, people with nonstandard educational paths

I'm a vet. This is a band-aid and I'd discourage you from thinking this way because it's short term at best.

If you want to hire more vets then companies need to find where vets are. Some of us use our VA benefits and get a degree, others meet the stress of post-separation and collapse. Both will still end up in the field, but companies will not train or treat them the same. That's why companies are now doing that whole, "atypical background" search. Apprenticeship programs within companies would also strengthen vet (and other DEI category) numbers given the absence of an industry wide apprenticeship program.

It was always my opinion that if the goal is more diverse hiring then more diverse sourcing is required.

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

#606

Post by yes_really »

bell-cot wrote: post #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 c…

It's incredible the amount of mental gymnastics you do when men are being denied whole careers simply because of their gender and you still somehow try to spin this as women being the real victims.

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

#607

Post by [deleted] »

bumby wrote: post #340
t_mann wrote: post #208

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Would be interesting to compare this across areas. My impression is that eg Finance (another popular destination for mid-career switches) is far more open in that regard. Experience, even if it's in a different field (as long as it's a technical role or one that will give you a rich set of contacts) seems to generally confer seniority. Would be interesting if someone could weigh in.

Anecdotally, the hard engineering fields (e.g., mechanical, civil, etc.) are much more tolerant about age and more receptive to the benefits and tradeoffs of both youth and, erm.., "experience" (said tongue-in-cheek because age does not necessarily equate to experience)

[deleted]

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

#608

Post by forum_ghost »

spaetzleesser wrote: post #352
bumby wrote: post #340

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Anecdotally, the hard engineering fields (e.g., mechanical, civil, etc.) are much more tolerant about age and more receptive to the benefits and tradeoffs of both youth and, erm.., "experience" (said tongue-in-cheek because age does not necessarily equate to experience)

Probably most regulated industries. I am in medical devices and you can easily make it to 65 with dignity.

because fail-forward works so great with implanted defibrillators, I presume?

/s

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

#609

Post by yes_really »

spzb wrote: post #573
at_a_remove wrote: post #223

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have mentioned this on Hacker News before: At this one job, we had only two remotely viable candidates for an open position. I was on the hiring committee, as I often was in those days. Candidate A: Had worked in the industry, had all of the qualifications, already chock-full of some interesting ideas I wanted to hear more of from the interview alone. Excited at the prospect. Candidate B: Had never worked in the in…

There are morons in a lot of jobs. It sounds like you had one making the decisions. It's only an anecdote though.

How many anecdotes have you heard of hiring committees explicitly discriminating against blacks or women?

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

#610

Post by twofornone »

Robotbeat wrote: post #595
twofornone wrote: post #589

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This isn't about my personal feelings, it's about the insistence that the demographics are not a reflection of the distribution of competence and personal choice, but discrimination. The entire foundation of discrimination against white males is dishonest because proponents refuse to allow for any explanation for overrepresentation beyond unfair hiring practices - which are being used to implement the systemic discri…

Look, it’s not helpful when making the case that white males (which I am, BTW) are being discriminated against and that we should feel bad about that and fix it when folks start saying “but actually women aren’t as smart at the high end as men and so…”

Then how are we supposed to argue against the false claim that discrimination is the primary driver of demographic underrepresentation if this is the true cause?
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