Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Employers Used Facebook to Keep Women and Older Workers from Seeing Job Ads

propublica.org

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

181–190 of 487 posts

Re: Employers Used Facebook to Keep Women and Older Workers from Seeing Job Ads

#181

Post by macintux »

seanmcdirmid wrote: post #172
formercoder wrote: post #168

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is it biased in a bad way? It’s really hard to measure someone’s ability to do a job, especially for a more senior role. Therefore, I feel comfortable hiring people recommended to me by others that I trust.

Because white men that dominate those jobs already typically know white men to recommend for those jobs.

Director of engineering at a former employer once said in the span of 30 seconds: “we’re trying to hire more diversity” and “please reach out to your social network”.

To an audience of 98% white males.

The director acknowledged the incongruity, thankfully, but never solved the problem.

Re: Employers Used Facebook to Keep Women and Older Workers from Seeing Job Ads

#182

Post by toss1 »

mlthoughts2018 wrote: post #133
yawaramin wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I meant what are the sociological / philosophical reasons. Are you asking why it's bad to discriminate against women, foreigners, and older people in hiring?

No, and it’s fairly ludicrous to even suppose it. I’m asking why we choose to emphasize this along some axes of characteristics and not along others. E.g. introvert / extravert axis is something employers are free to discriminate / harass along (e.g. open plan office layouts, less “outgoing” people often paid much less for the same job) even though it likely causes as much damage as any other axis that roughly splits…

So, you now claim that:

because there exist some characteristic axes that are not protected,

that it is therefore impossible that the reason that some classes are protected cannot, by definition be in order to mitigate hare and provide equitable treatment?

That is like saying: 'in 1875, because women didn't yet have the right to vote, the purpose of banning slavery could not have been to reduce harm to the slaves and give them equality, because women are still being harmed and are unequal'.

I'd like to know, if you think that the purpose of the EOE laws is not to reduce harm and promote equitable treatment, what do you think IS the purpose of these laws?

Re: Employers Used Facebook to Keep Women and Older Workers from Seeing Job Ads

#183

Post by kjs3 »

big_chungus wrote: post #166
kjs3 wrote: post #156

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are you actually equating placing ads for makeup or intimates with placing ads for a job? You are the very definition of the problem .

Not really, because it's a question of principle: is it okay to target to a specific demographic, or not; and does that vary based on whether we are discussing a legally-protected class? The significance of what is being advertised doesn't exactly change the definition of right and wrong. If we're being honest, cosmo is probably as accurate a filtering mechanism for white, middle-aged, middle-class women as facebook…

Quit conflating the issue.

The poster you're defending (and, frankly, the whole argument) was trying to make the point that "targeted ads", as a category and devoid of context, was a good thing because you reach the target you want to reach. Fair enough. But if it's an employment ad, and you only want to reach upper class white males, well, that's discrimination. Period. If your "principles" enable that, well there you go.

Re: Employers Used Facebook to Keep Women and Older Workers from Seeing Job Ads

#184

Post by macintux »

jlawson wrote: post #107
NeedMoreTea wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We have decided as nations and societies that some forms of economic discrimination are too damaging to permit. The details vary, but typically the things we can't easily change: race, nationality, age etc. Such discrimination is generally outlawed. Someone lacking relevant market skills or education etc can go out and fix that.

>Someone lacking relevant market skills or education etc can go out and fix that. Not really, if they lack economic resources, have dependents, have low IQ, low grit, or lots of other reasons. Ultimately it comes down to what parts of a person you think they are 'responsible for' and what parts they aren't. You're saying that someone being a certain skin color isn't something they should lose opportunities for, but i…

The lack of an equal shot is no excuse to make things even more unequal, wouldn’t you agree?

Re: Employers Used Facebook to Keep Women and Older Workers from Seeing Job Ads

#185

Post by shkkmo »

big_chungus wrote: post #166
kjs3 wrote: post #156

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are you actually equating placing ads for makeup or intimates with placing ads for a job? You are the very definition of the problem .

Not really, because it's a question of principle: is it okay to target to a specific demographic, or not; and does that vary based on whether we are discussing a legally-protected class? The significance of what is being advertised doesn't exactly change the definition of right and wrong. If we're being honest, cosmo is probably as accurate a filtering mechanism for white, middle-aged, middle-class women as facebook…

> The significance of what is being advertised doesn't exactly change the definition of right and wrong.

We are discussing legality and yes, what is being advertised has a significant impact. The rules around employment and housing are VERY different from the rules around makeup and viagra.

> The issue seems to be when people _exclude_ certain groups, rather than when people _target_ specific ones;

Nope, both are illegal (for protected classes) when it comes to housing and employment.

Re: Employers Used Facebook to Keep Women and Older Workers from Seeing Job Ads

#186

Post by shkkmo »

zaroth wrote: post #50
analog31 wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The targeted ads in question relate to employment, which is governed by standards for what kinds of discrimination are legal and illegal.

Ok, so are you allowed to place employment ads in Cosmo? Is it Ok just because it’s overwhelming likely to be women who see it, versus algorithmically targeting women?

> Ok, so are you allowed to place employment ads in Cosmo?

Yes, if you take care to balance your ad placement so that your job opening advertising policy is not biased against protected classes.

> because it’s overwhelming likely to be women who see it, versus algorithmically targeting women?

That doesn't matter. What matters is the end effect of the advertising policy.

Re: Employers Used Facebook to Keep Women and Older Workers from Seeing Job Ads

#187

Post by shkkmo »

gbear605 wrote: post #71
zaroth wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ok, so are you allowed to place employment ads in Cosmo? Is it Ok just because it’s overwhelming likely to be women who see it, versus algorithmically targeting women?

That is how it works legally, yes.

No, that is not how it works.

> The laws enforced by EEOC prohibit an employer or other covered entity from using neutral employment policies and practices that have a disproportionately negative effect on applicants or employees of a particular race, color, religion, sex (including gender identity, sexual orientation, and pregnancy), or national origin, or on an individual with a disability or class of individuals with disabilities, if the polices or practices at issue are not job-related and necessary to the operation of the business. [0]

[0] https://www.eeoc.gov//laws/practices/

Re: Employers Used Facebook to Keep Women and Older Workers from Seeing Job Ads

#188

Post by [deleted] »

gweinberg wrote: post #101
dragonwriter wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Why is it legal to charge men more for car insurance? Because car insurance isn't employment, is separately regulated, and does not exclude gender from permissible inputs into actuarial calculations.

You realize you just said "it's legal because it's legal", right?

[deleted]

Re: Employers Used Facebook to Keep Women and Older Workers from Seeing Job Ads

#189

Post by shkkmo »

gnicholas wrote: post #116

Could these legal arguments be extended to lookalike audiences that are built off of email lists that have a gender imbalance? That is, imagine I go to a university to recruit, and I talk with 200 male students and 10 female students. I then take their email addresses and make a lookalike audience to advertise my jobs to. Could that be challenged on the grounds that I am trying to advertise to male students? What if…

Yes, easily because only thing that is necessary (in the US) is the disparate effect of your employment policies (edit: and the relevancy of those policies to the position being filled):

> The laws enforced by EEOC prohibit an employer or other covered entity from using neutral employment policies and practices that have a disproportionately negative effect on applicants or employees of a particular race, color, religion, sex (including gender identity, sexual orientation, and pregnancy), or national origin, or on an individual with a disability or class of individuals with disabilities, if the polices or practices at issue are not job-related and necessary to the operation of the business. [0]

[0] https://www.eeoc.gov//laws/practices/

Re: Employers Used Facebook to Keep Women and Older Workers from Seeing Job Ads

#190

Post by dragonwriter »

SpicyLemonZest wrote: post #145
seanmcdirmid wrote: post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What if the bias was learned by a neural network or other algorithm (eg historical insurance costs, page rank, ...)? Does that somehow make it legal if they make an inference about a protected class and stop advertising to them?

That kind of thing is why the doctrine of disparate impact was developed. There are a lot of messy edge cases (everything has some correlation with one or another protected class), but if I end up never advertising to men the fact that I'm using a neural network won't protect me.

> That kind of thing is why the doctrine of disparate impact was developed.

It's really not; disparate impact deals with it, but the doctrine was articulated in a case with ample evidence that the policy at issue, though facially neutral, was adopted as a deliberate replacement for explicit racial discrimination with an intent to maintain it's discriminatory effect and without other business purpose, and the doctrine was clearly intended principally to address such veiled-substitute policies.

Post reply on HN