SO much this.
We detached this subthread from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13430654 and marked it off-topic.
U.S. sues Oracle, alleges salary and hiring discrimination
481–490 of 507 posts
Re: U.S. sues Oracle, alleges salary and hiring discrimination
#482Earlier quoted context omitted.
Are you serious? Do you work for Oracle or have you taken their interviews? Oracle has many many departments. Do you know about Server Technologies (the RDBMS department)? When I applied for Oracle Server Technologies in 2016, I found their interviews to be of the same difficulty level as that of Amazon and Google. They expect a single candidate to know everything from real world work involving Linux kernel details a…
Did you misread my question? If Oracle is as hard to get into as Google or Amazon as you claim then you can get past an interview at another company too. There's no reason to choose Oracle.
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Re: U.S. sues Oracle, alleges salary and hiring discrimination
#483Earlier quoted context omitted.
Give me a break. You are insane if you think auto mechanics, miners, truck drivers, plumbers, construction workers, landscapers, or working on fishing vessels, or other physically demanding, laborious jobs, are not preferred more by men than women. 5 women and 1 court case (and no lawyer ever set up a lawsuit like that, right?) does not change all of those facts. You need to realize that your worldview and own person…
The heaviest thing an auto mechanic typically lifts is a tire. Everything else is going to be lifted by a hoist, because no human, male or female, can pull an engine out of a car. Auto mechanic is, in fact, a skilled job involving a mental model of a very complex system, diagnosis, testing, research, and tool usage. Modern mining is done primarily by machines which are tended to by mechanics. Ever wonder why there ar…
You are sounding like you have never worked in a job like this. I have worked for a carpenter and an automechanic. Ever seen someone unable to even get the heat shrink wrap off a pneumatic tool and replace the lines? I saw someone unable to do it and end up gashing their hand as they were trying to cut it off. Ever work under a hot engine bay for 8 hours? Holding your hands above your head the entire time, and developing pain in your neck? Ever used an angle grinder? Should I trust you with one? Ever lifted 300lb pieces of granite, cut them to size and polish them? That's hard work. Do you think you can do it?
Besides, by focusing 100% on this physical aspect you're nearly just attack a straw man argument and ignoring the substance of everything else. Not every person is exactly the same and it doesn't matter. Get over it.
Re: U.S. sues Oracle, alleges salary and hiring discrimination
#484Earlier quoted context omitted.
Are you serious? Do you work for Oracle or have you taken their interviews? Oracle has many many departments. Do you know about Server Technologies (the RDBMS department)? When I applied for Oracle Server Technologies in 2016, I found their interviews to be of the same difficulty level as that of Amazon and Google. They expect a single candidate to know everything from real world work involving Linux kernel details a…
Did you misread my question? If Oracle is as hard to get into as Google or Amazon as you claim then you can get past an interview at another company too. There's no reason to choose Oracle.
I work for Oracle. I had my reasons to choose Oracle.
First, the facts.
* I could clear Oracle interviews and get an offer. I applied for a RDBMS development position in Oracle ST.
* I could also clear Apple interviews and get an offer. Apple interviews were easier than Oracle ST's.
* I could clear interviews in several startups and other small companies too.
* I could not clear interviews in Google. I did not get an offer.
* I did not apply to Microsoft, Facebook or Amazon.
Now, the reasons.
* Oracle ST (RDBMS) provided me an opportunity to work in system development in C and ASM language down to the level of Linux syscalls and memory management (think custom memory allocators, designing locking semantics, distributed file systems).
* I was almost ready to join Apple because the offered work was quite similar to Oracle's and the offered salary was about 5% more than Oracle's but Apple's stringent security policies turned me off. I learnt that Apple would dictate what I can and cannot discuss with my wife. I learnt that I cannot discuss with a friend within the same company what I was working on. All of this may be reasonable from Apple's perspective but I wanted to work for some place with more open culture.
* Most startups and small companies I could get offer from required me to work on web services in Java, Python, Node.js, etc. This kind of work does not interest me.
* I could not solve all the algorithm problems asked by Google but I found Oracle ST's interview a little bit easier. I could solve most of Oracle ST's interview problems and got an offer.
* The openings available in Microsoft, Facebook and Amazon did not interest me. Moreover, I felt I was under-prepared for Facebook's interviews. I felt I was well-prepared for Amazon's interviews. I have many friends in Amazon and I don't find them happy due to long working hours. I learnt that they require developers to provide on-call support at add hours. These things scared me a little bit. Due to these reasons I did not apply to these companies.
So considering the offers I could manage to get and my love for system programming, I had a strong reason to choose Oracle over the other offers.
Why is it so hard to believe that everyone working in Oracle would similarly have their own reasons to choose Oracle?
Re: U.S. sues Oracle, alleges salary and hiring discrimination
#485Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Speaking personally, I found that work environments with lots of new or unamericanized immigrants had little collaboration, little in-office comraderie, and no socialization outside of work (e.g. pub nights). It was boring and I pined for a culturally American setting. Sometimes "multicultural" just means the subset of all cultures involved. It sounds like you just wish they were more like you? Isn't this the kind…
>It sounds like you just wish they were more like you? Isn't this the kind of mentality that prevents diversity? Using your definition of diversity, yes. I think that part of the point in making is that people maintain diversity as the ultimate goal. If it's directly harmful to the more characteristic goals of your grad program or company, is it really worth it? (I'm not advocating for discrimination, but using fewer…
> Using your definition of diversity, yes. I think that part of the point in making is that people maintain diversity as the ultimate goal. If it's directly harmful to the more characteristic goals of your grad program or company, is it really worth it? (I'm not advocating for discrimination, but using fewer visas isn't discrimination.)
I missed this point in your original comment, so I appreciate that you took the time to respond and point it out to me. That's a very interesting point.
> Meh. I don't think drinking should be the only group activity, but a little alcohol goes goes a long way in getting people comfortable with one another.
I can only speak from my own perspective as someone who doesn't like being around alcohol, but this seems like it'd make it so that some people felt like became closer to the team while others felt left out. I suppose my bias in this matter is obvious.
Re: U.S. sues Oracle, alleges salary and hiring discrimination
#486Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Women will always have longer lifespans and higher average IQs than men Then why is it that on average they get paid less than men for the same job? Surely if they are inherently "smarter", they should be dominating the knowledge economy and earning more than men. The fact that they don't points to some greater opposing force that needs addressing.
> Surely if they are inherently "smarter", they should be dominating the knowledge economy Does the CEO have the highest IQ in the company? Is the president the most intelligent person in the country?
Well, certainly not as of tomorrow!
Re: U.S. sues Oracle, alleges salary and hiring discrimination
#487Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Surely if they are inherently "smarter", they should be dominating the knowledge economy Does the CEO have the highest IQ in the company? Is the president the most intelligent person in the country?
Well, certainly not as of tomorrow!
Great. Now I need a hug.
Re: U.S. sues Oracle, alleges salary and hiring discrimination
#488Earlier quoted context omitted.
Give me a break. You are insane if you think auto mechanics, miners, truck drivers, plumbers, construction workers, landscapers, or working on fishing vessels, or other physically demanding, laborious jobs, are not preferred more by men than women. 5 women and 1 court case (and no lawyer ever set up a lawsuit like that, right?) does not change all of those facts. You need to realize that your worldview and own person…
I unfortunately think you are undermining your own argument here with this focus. It's clear that institutional biases and societal biases exist, and that some of these biases may act as steering currents for certain people to go into certain careers. However, there always will be some cases of people who like to "steer against the current" and work in a field that's outside the society-traditional bias in one way or…
>A good goal, I think, is to ensure that merit is the chief qualification for employment
I agree with you
>It's clear that institutional biases and societal biases exist, and that some of these biases may act as steering currents for certain people to go into certain careers.
We agree on that, too
>If someone can do the job well, they should do it if they are good at it. I do know someone, for instance, who's a female welder. Apparently, only 5% of welders are women. Well, she's one of them and from all indications she's good at it. Luckily, the place she works at doesn't have a "welding is a MAN's job" sort of attitude.
That's good. I would never want to work somewhere that had an attitude that "this is a man's job, only men can do it"
>Now, whether or not government enforced action (eg, to what degree, and what tools, governments should use to challenge the bias) is a good thing or not, I think that's more of an open question.
I agree with you there as well. Even though I wouldn't want to work for a company that refused to hire women due to some illogical bigotry, I don't think it's government's role to force results on to who companies can hire.
Look, we agree on almost everything, but I think you and others are missing my point because this is an emotionally sensitive topic for some people, and one that the media has also blown out of proportion. The idea that there are no differences between people is totally fraudulent. When are we going to sue the NBA for discriminating against Asians? What's the point if we don't? There are huge differences even between men and women. Serena and Venus Williams claimed they could beat any man in Tennis, and so they ended up playing a 203'rd ranked player "after he had a case of beer and a smoke," and neither could barely score a single point against him. There are differences between people and that's the way it is.
If any of these people arguing against this actually cared about human rights or civil liberties they'd have said so by now. What they really care about are their feelings. That's what this is about - that, and lawyers cashing in on new diversity laws.
Re: U.S. sues Oracle, alleges salary and hiring discrimination
#489Earlier quoted context omitted.
I'm on an H-1B, and the thing that infuriates me about the dialogue on this is that they are effectively trying to ban skilled immigration, and exclude people like me from coming. If you don't qualify for the family-based or refugee route, employment-based immigration is the only viable pathway. The amount of hate I see piled on people trying to come here via the employment-based immigration seems insane to me. These…
I mean when it comes down to it choosing a neurosurgeon over an entry level software developer makes a lot of sense. What is wrong with wanting to prioritise people who have lots of experience and skill?
Why even prioritize? The need to prioritize assumes the existence of arbitrary numerical limits on immigration.
I think we should just eliminate the limits on employment-based immigration entirely, with the only restriction being that such immigration does not depress US wages (which is already implemented as the LCA today). At the very least, use qualitative limits, not quantitative limits.
But even better, just let peaceful immigrants in. Before 1921, if you were white, there were no restrictions on you moving to the US. So, let's go back to the pre-1921 immigration policy, with the slight modification that non-white people are not banned. The Libertarian Party makes a good argument: https://www.lp.org/issues/immigration
Re: U.S. sues Oracle, alleges salary and hiring discrimination
#490Earlier quoted context omitted.
"Why does Brian earn more than I do?" - "He is better than you, simple as that". I think happiness levels in companies would definitely skyrocket... Wonder what the experience in Sweden is, though. How often do people query their Coworkers salaries there?
To which the proper response is: "We favor Brian because he's on-time, he's thorough, he communicates well, he's responsible, and he doesn't blame others. We can set him up to mentor you if you'd like, and here's how we'll measure your growth"
The person you tell that might not agree with your assessment, and in fact feel even more insulted. Also, I am not sure if everybody can reach the same level of competence. Not saying it is impossible, just that I don't know what is the current state scientific knowledge with respect to that.
Certainly, for example with men and women, there would be physical tasks were women can not reach the level of men.