| It's factually wrong. If you (try to) eliminate race from hiring, you don't lower the bar. You raise it, because suddenly there's a group of so-so engineers who now can't get a job just because they're white. If that feels uncomfortable, replace "white" with "MIT student". Or any other in-group. If you almost exclusively hire from a single group, at some point just being part of that group makes it easier for you to get a job. As far as I can tell, nobody is asking for hiring quotas based on profile. What people are asking for is an equal chance. For pretty much any group that's not white/asian male, tech has an issue. The percentage of the minority group in the general demographic is higher than the percentage of people in that group graduating. The percentage of graduates is higher than the percentage of people hired. The percentage of people hired is higher than the percentage of people promoted. All this diversity thing is asking for is that we take a look why the percentages are decreasing. E.g. for black people: They're 12% of the general work force. 4.5% of CS bachelors are black. 2% of SV tech employees are black. 1% of Fortune-500 CEOs are black. There's constant attrition going on, while the number of the main demographic increases as you go up the ladder. (This general relationships hold for other minorities as well, but I don't have numbers handy right now) That's what diversity asks for - stop the steady attrition of anybody who's not in the majority group. |
Anyway. Are you sure it's a good idea to compare numbers like recent grad percentages and Fortune-500 CEOs? These two in particular strike me as separated by several decades in which society has changed. Perhaps not the most useful comment on current society.