[stale2002]

> If it genuinely screens for basic math, then there's nothing racist about it.

Lets say that Google added a test for its engineers, that screened for writing and communication skills. Think, SAT verbal questions or something. And lets say that it just so happens that women are a lot better at SAT verbal questions than men.

Would you call that meritocrat, to ask vocabulary questions to software engineers, given that they know that men will do much worse on them?

[reefoctopus]

I don’t see a problem with that as long as everyone takes the same test. An individual’s skills are not bound by the race and gender to which they belong.

[stcredzero]

Would you call that meritocrat, to ask vocabulary questions to software engineers, given that they know that men will do much worse on them?

My verbal scores happened to be better than my math scores on both the SAT and the GRE, so I'd be all for this! Someone did a study in the 80's that suggested that programmers had to do more interaction involving details than other jobs. Good verbal abilities are going to help out, in my view.

[ygaf]

This is not analogous to OP without the additional detail that communication skills are 'clearly needed' in the job.