Why are there so few black tech entrepreneurs? • Hacker News Board

Re: Why are there so few black tech entrepreneurs?

#61

Post by Gibbon1 » Fri, Sep 04, 2020, 9:32 PM UTC

charlesu wrote: post #57

mytailorisrich wrote: post #4

For whatever reasons, it seems to me that relatively few black people study for engineering and science degrees. At least that's my feeling in Europe. Then it's simply a trickle down effect, like for women in tech: Few choose this path so even fewer end up being tech entrepreneurs or at Google/Facebook, etc (since the article mentions the workforce of these companies). So, once again, education from primary/secondary…

There are many, many non-technical founders. Most jobs at Google and Facebook are not in engineering. A lack of blacks in computer science might explain why the engineering department has only two black employees but how do we explain the sales team?

Thought.

Old school. If you needed another team member HR and the Boss would hire one. And you'd have to work with them. If the company thought they weren't hiring enough women and blacks they'd just hire some women and blacks.

New way, we only hire from the top schools and programs. And we allow members of the team to act as gate keepers over vague things like 'cultural fit'. Over time your team becomes composed entirely of upper class whites and a few model minorities.

Re: Why are there so few black tech entrepreneurs?

#62

Post by tootahe45 » Fri, Sep 04, 2020, 9:35 PM UTC

mytailorisrich wrote: post #4

For whatever reasons, it seems to me that relatively few black people study for engineering and science degrees. At least that's my feeling in Europe. Then it's simply a trickle down effect, like for women in tech: Few choose this path so even fewer end up being tech entrepreneurs or at Google/Facebook, etc (since the article mentions the workforce of these companies). So, once again, education from primary/secondary…

I've pointed this out for the women in tech debate. Probably 3 of the 30 or so CS students were women here.

So the question becomes why do blacks and women want tech jobs without becoming qualified for said tech jobs? or do they even want tech jobs in the first place? is it just someone else who wants them to have tech jobs?

Re: Why are there so few black tech entrepreneurs?

#63

Post by burfog » Fri, Sep 04, 2020, 9:42 PM UTC

cvhashim wrote: post #47

Why is this flagged?

It won't generate a reasonable intellectual discussion. Some of the most common opinions on the matter are unspeakable in polite society.

Y Combinator co-founder Paul Graham has this to say on that trouble:

http://www.paulgraham.com/say.html

You can't have an honest discussion when not everybody can speak their mind.

Re: Why are there so few black tech entrepreneurs?

#64

Post by burfog » Fri, Sep 04, 2020, 9:49 PM UTC

tootahe45 wrote: post #62

mytailorisrich wrote: post #4

For whatever reasons, it seems to me that relatively few black people study for engineering and science degrees. At least that's my feeling in Europe. Then it's simply a trickle down effect, like for women in tech: Few choose this path so even fewer end up being tech entrepreneurs or at Google/Facebook, etc (since the article mentions the workforce of these companies). So, once again, education from primary/secondary…

I've pointed this out for the women in tech debate. Probably 3 of the 30 or so CS students were women here. So the question becomes why do blacks and women want tech jobs without becoming qualified for said tech jobs? or do they even want tech jobs in the first place? is it just someone else who wants them to have tech jobs?

For real-life trolling fun at a university, head over to the people who are really complaining about the lack of women in STEM. They'll be in Gender Studies or something like that. Suggest that they can take action against the problem by changing their major to something in STEM.

Re: Why are there so few black tech entrepreneurs?

#65

Post by rbecker » Fri, Sep 04, 2020, 9:52 PM UTC

founderofcolour wrote: post #3

Posting anonymous for obvious reasons. I'm not black, but I am a minority. The racism in tech is so obvious, my eyes bleed sometimes. At my workplace, they will consistently take an average white worker (no special degrees, no special schools) and promote them over and over until they are multiple levels higher than others. Its all BLM woo haa on slack but what really matters is promotions, raises, projects, opportun…

We can do better than anecdote. 74% of the largest tech firms executives are white [1]. This perfectly reflects 1990 demographics, when the US was 76% white [2]. A 30 year lag between arriving to a country, and becoming an executive, seems more than reasonable.

[1] https://phys.org/news/2018-06-diversity-silicon-valley-tech-... - using weighted average of the histogram.

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Historical_racial_and_ethnic_d...

Re: Why are there so few black tech entrepreneurs?

#66

Post by athms » Fri, Sep 04, 2020, 9:53 PM UTC

Ancapistani wrote: post #2

While bias in hiring is certainly an issue, I don’t believe that its the primary factor. Most of this disparity is due to differences in opportunity. Blacks in the US are less likely to have the resources at their disposal to enter our field. They are less likely to have two parents at home, to be able to afford college on their own, to have the familial financial and emotional support system necessary to have the re…

>Blacks in the US are less likely to have the resources at their disposal to enter our field.

What is "our" field? Food service? Car repair? Carpet cleaning?

>to be able to afford college on their own

No college is needed to be an entrepreneur.

Re: Why are there so few black tech entrepreneurs?

#67

Post by burfog » Fri, Sep 04, 2020, 9:59 PM UTC

Gibbon1 wrote: post #61

charlesu wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are many, many non-technical founders. Most jobs at Google and Facebook are not in engineering. A lack of blacks in computer science might explain why the engineering department has only two black employees but how do we explain the sales team?

Thought. Old school. If you needed another team member HR and the Boss would hire one. And you'd have to work with them. If the company thought they weren't hiring enough women and blacks they'd just hire some women and blacks. New way, we only hire from the top schools and programs. And we allow members of the team to act as gate keepers over vague things like 'cultural fit'. Over time your team becomes composed ent…

This is interesting: "upper class whites and a few model minorities"

Discrimination against the lower class is invisible within the white population. It just goes undetected. It is never reported to the government. Group photos doesn't raise suspicion.

If race and class are correlated, then one type of discrimination can be misdetected as the other.

Re: Why are there so few black tech entrepreneurs?

#68

Post by krapp » Fri, Sep 04, 2020, 10:07 PM UTC

Ancapistani wrote: post #26

umvi wrote: post #16

Like mentioned in the article, only 13% of Americans are black[0]. Secondly, nearly 30% of that 13% are living in poverty[1]. So really you only have ~8% of Americans who are both black and not in poverty. From there it gets whittled down further for cultural reasons. You could similarly ask "where are there so few white rappers?" or "why are there so few male nurses?" and find cultural reasons and pressures involved…

“Cultural reasons” is often a “dog whistle” term. I don’t believe that’s the case here, and am responding in that spirit. Why does “Black culture” in the US differ from “White culture”? I believe it’s because their experiences differ. Blacks in the US are disproportionately poor, urban, and from unstable home environments. While I don’t have facts to back this up, I expect that if we compared groups segmented by thes…

>Why does “Black culture” in the US differ from “White culture”?

One factor - white Americans have historically identified not as "white" primarily, but by country of origin - Italian, German, British, etc. "White" as a culture tends to be used as a reference in contrast with and in comparison to "black" culture or people.

Whereas African slaves and their descendants were deprived of the opportunity to identify with their culture and countries of origin, so they had to build a cultural identity around the only common attribute and heritage they were afforded - their race.

Re: Why are there so few black tech entrepreneurs?

#69

Post by krapp » Fri, Sep 04, 2020, 10:08 PM UTC

burfog wrote: post #63

cvhashim wrote: post #47

Why is this flagged?

It won't generate a reasonable intellectual discussion. Some of the most common opinions on the matter are unspeakable in polite society. Y Combinator co-founder Paul Graham has this to say on that trouble: http://www.paulgraham.com/say.html You can't have an honest discussion when not everybody can speak their mind.

>You can't have an honest discussion when not everybody can speak their mind.

Yes, you certainly can.

Looking through the thread I see a lot of what appears to me to be honest discussion, and I would also consider it of reasonable intellectual level. Those common "unspeakable" opinions you allude to tend to drag the quality of discussions down, rather than lift them up.

But if it helps, everyone is aware of those opinions, it's just that most people just don't find them interesting or worth discussing.

Re: Why are there so few black tech entrepreneurs?

#70

Post by athms » Fri, Sep 04, 2020, 10:43 PM UTC

Mc91 wrote: post #6

Tech entrepreneurs come out of IT. In the US, when I was a teenager, blacks kids who were into computers were doing the same things the other people going to computer clubs and whatnot did. Some knew more than a lot of the white kids. As people graduated high school, went to college, got internships and jobs, somewhere along that route a lot of them fell off. Also, I worked at some places with a lower manager that ju…

I have been in the IT business for thirty years in Silicon Valley and have interviewed hundreds of candidates, not one of them was black. I can count on one hand the number of blacks I have worked with in that period of time.

Black college students are over represented in low earning majors. Blacks that focus on high paying majors go into law, medicine, or business. If black leaders want more black IT executives, they need to push black kids into IT related careers.

https://cew.georgetown.edu/cew-reports/african-american-majo...

>I worked at some places with a lower manager that just seemed to have it in for the staff black IT person for no discernible reason

That mentality can be seen in anybody. When I did consulting in the late 1990s, I had a client company where an Indian manager refused to promote or hire non-Indians. Same company, an engineer from Taiwan gave bad marks on interviews if the candidate was of Korean descent. He told me, "I won't work with gooks."