[rosterface]

I recently completed a very difficult job search where I unfortunately had to lean on my ethnicity (I’m Mexican) to pass through very overt screening against white men. I was shocked to hear from multiple companies, large and small, that they did not want men and white men in particular.

Now we see a YC co-founder giving 40 women $9000 to learn to program.

Where does it end? I was really sad that while I personally can survive in this environment (if I abandon my ideals of not being judged by my genetics), many good men who are passionate about their work are being pressured from all sides.

I honestly don’t see how any of this is legal but it’s such a taboo to talk about that fixing the problem seems impossible without a major shift back to valuing skills above demographics.

[manfredo]

I can confirm your observations. At my company we have a couple policies.

1. We only accept applicstions from candidate from non-traditional backgrounds if they're diverse. Diverse is defined as any of the following: women, black, Hispanic, or native American - maybe also veterans but I'm not sure. Non-traditional background means coming from a coding boot camp, or majoring in a non-computing related field. I think after 3 years industry experience candidates are considered traditional even if they came from one of those two.*

2. Diverse candidates get two attempts to pass the technical phone interview, non diverse get one.*

That said, when it comes to the hiring decision we don't discriminate. No disrespect for those candidates considered diverse, just take what you get. And I'm Cuban myself (but not visibly Latino) so I may have benefitted from that part of my identity myself.

Untimely I think the lower representation of Black and Hispanic people in tech roles is reflective of education rates. I suspect that were incomes and education more equal that would make representation in tech more equal. There also geography. Not many tech companies in the south where most black people live.

As for women thats a more difficult situation. I think that there's strong evidence to back up the claim that women may not choose to enter tech on their own volition. I think the solution to that is to emphasize the value of fields other than tech. Being coder at Google doesn't make a person any more valuable than a lawyer, marketer, salesperson, etc. Sure they may make more money, but that's the product of the labor market. And not to mention the average lawyer probably makes more than the average coder.

I've anecdotally seen a growing portion of coding boot camp that are exclusive to certain demographics. I wonder how much of that is due to policies like these. Especially for boot camps that only charge if the graduates get jobs in tech, I can see how it would be disadvantageous to admit white and Asian men.

* Edit: I just checked and these policies also apply to people with referrals. So one could justify this by saying we treat diverse candidates as though they have a referral.

[pacala]

> Diverse candidates get two attempts to pass the technical phone interview, non diverse get one.

These rhyme with soviet era policies circa 1950-1960 in Eastern Europe. At universities, there was an admission exam for 'healthy origin' people for the majority of the spots, and then another exam where everybody, including those failing the first time, could compete for the scraps. We all know how that turned out economically speaking.

Seeing the same policies in XXI century USA is surreal.

[manfredo]

To be fair, the tech companies are stuck between a rock and a hard place. The media has been heavily pushing the narrative that women are underrepresented at these tech companies - and they are compared to the general population. But I've seen plenty of stories, even from reputable sources like the NYT, criticizing tech companies for only hiring 20-25% women while failing to mention that this is exactly in line with the percentages of tech workers that are women. Same sort of deal with URM.

Ironically, the concern over discrimination in tech is itself the cause of a significant amount of explicit discrimination.

[europsucks]

Maybe tech companies shouldn't let journalists tell them how to run their companies.

[dragonwriter]

> But I've seen plenty of stories, even from reputable sources like the NYT, criticizing tech companies for only hiring 20-25% women while failing to mention that this is exactly in line with the percentages of tech workers that are women.

If the industry is systematically unfavorable to women, hiring at the same percentage as the industry as a whole (which is what matching the “percentage of tech workers that are women” is) is indicative of being fully on-line with the average degree to which the industry is systematically unfavorable to women.

It would be inconsistent to criticize the industry but not firms that were dead in the middle of the pack.

[pathseeker]

>If the industry is systematically unfavorable to women

It's not. The CS graduation ratio is just as bad.

[dragonwriter]

> The CS graduation ratio is just as bad.

If the industry were either actually or even merely perceived as systematically unfavorable to women, a natural consequence would be women being less likely to pursue education focussed on the field in preference to other fields that were less unfavorable.

[manfredo]

Sure, but everyone seems to be assuming that it's systematically unfavorable towards women solely based on the fact that women make up less than parity.

That claim only works if one assumes that any disparity is the result of systematic bias.

[kyle-rb]

I don't think the person you're replying to is criticizing the industry though. From what I can tell, they're saying it's not the industry's fault that it lacks women.

That's how I see it anyway: mainly based on the fact that women make up only around 20% of CS majors, I don't think the issue lies in the hiring practices of most tech companies.

[dragonwriter]

> I don't think the person you're replying to is criticizing the industry though.

No, but the people they are criticizing for criticizing firms hiring at industrt-average proprotions are also criticizing the industry, which is the issue.

[europsucks]

If hiring was the issue, there would have to be a pool of IT women who can't find a job. I don't think such a pool exists.

[tracker1]

So 40-45% of the population gets the shaft is what you're saying. While I understand a desire to have a more diverse company in general.. the overall population is definitely not 1:1:1:1 for each ethnic/gender group... And every tech hiring study I've seen seems to indicate a bias in favor of women, meaning the issue is either self-selective or generally in education circles, which is driving the issue.

[llama052]

Is it fair to claim equal opportunity when you give more opportunities to other people?

You are ultimately selecting the factors which could affect the outcome of that opportunity.

How is that not discrimination? How do you pick and choose what you consider diverse?

When you select the factors you're ultimately not an equal opportunity employer anymore in my opinion.

[manfredo]

> Is it fair to claim equal opportunity when you give more opportunities to other people?

Googles careers page advertises that they're both in equal opportunity employer and an affirmative action employer:

> Google is proud to be an equal opportunity workplace and is an affirmative action employer.

https://careers.google.com/teams/?&src=Online/House%20Ads/BK...

So I guess the answer is yes.

[llama052]

That's so strange to me, how do you define equal opportunity when you directly affect that opportunity based on third party factors out of someones control.

[rosege]

I believe oxymoron is what its called.

[a figure of speech in which apparently contradictory terms appear in conjunction]

[jriot]

As a veteran, it has worked against me.

Next time I apply somewhere I am going to check Cajun or other since we have 'ethnic status'. I am certain we Cajuns aren't well represented in tech.

[jordigh]

If it's any consolation about how we underrepresented but unqualified idiots are getting hired everywhere, I've interviewed with Mozilla a couple of times now, selecting the "yep, I'm Mexican" tickbox, and this hasn't gotten me any more hired there either of the times I've interviewed.

I must be really awful if I can't get hired as a Mexican, eh?

[manfredo]

This misrepresentating my company's approach. We don't hire underqualified applicants if they're diverse. Rather we deliberately make it harder for white and Asian men to get to the on-site.

[llama052]

So the company is openly discriminating then?

[manfredo]

Openly... I'm not so sure. In our all hands meeting our head of HR consistently denies that diverse candidates are treated differently. When the Damore memo was sent out one of our senior VPs of engineering explicitly denied preference for diverse candidates.

But we do have tools for recruiters to cross reference applicant names with the US census bureau's data to infer race and gender. We give recruiter bigger bonuses for diverse hires and we set specific % targets for them in their OKRs (basically quarterly goals. They don't get fired if they go under this, so I hesitate to call it a quota). That, and the aforementioned practices surrounding interviews and non traditional backgrounds.

Looking deeper at the documentation, I think the company maintains plausible deniability by giving recruiters discretionary authority over things like number of phone interviews and initial resume review coupled with hiring targets well above the industry average (current target for women is 33%). So the company does openly discriminate, but it gives recruiters the tools and discretion to discriminate as well as goals that essentially require discrimination to achieve - after that it's "see no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil".

My previous statements about non traditional backgrounds and 2nd phone interviews came from recruiters themselves. I can also confirm that, absent a referral, I've done 2nd phone screens for diverse candidates and have never interviewed a non-diverse candidate from a non-traditional background.

[danielscrubs]

It's like we have given HR an a goal, namely diversity, that's easier to measure and doesn't require the technical knowledge of measuring skill, I can see how that gets very popular, very fast.

[dimgl]

How does anyone see this and not think this is absolutely insane? Surely this is illegal?

[ReturnToVoid]

I have sadly witnessed a lot of discrimination against white men recently as well. God forbid you happen to be a white man from a third-world country, you'll literally never get a single interview anywhere no matter how good you happen to be.

[manfredo]

I've seen even more against Asian men (not that it makes discrimination again white men any more okay). After all, if we are going to strive for for equal representation - which seems to be the goal - Asian are going to have to go down from 30-40% of many large companies down to a fraction of that. Asians are 14% of California and 5.2% of the US population.

[icelancer]

This is the currently acceptable form of prejudice in this country, yes. It is totally fine to enact policies or make statements that hurt Asian-American men (and women, I don't think gender is much of a factor here).

[manfredo]

In things like University it probably holds true. But in my company women of any race (including Asian) are considered diverse.

[bazooka_penguin]

They were getting lynched up into the 1900s by whites and Hispanics, put in camps in the mid 1900s, and discriminated against up until just a few generations ago, and now they're expected to lay down and be trodden upon, or else. Very cool, very progressive.

[zimablue]

Third world country is bad (although maybe the positive racial discrimination will count them in, I don't know) but the people who get screwed by this sort of thing are also the white working class. Most employers have some (fairly rational as well as irrational) desire to screen by class, alongside the people of the upper classes knowing how to game the system of education/etc. So when you push women and ethnicities in, you push white men out, and the ones who feel the pinch are the ones already onto a loser.

[Tade0]

Third world country is bad (although maybe the positive racial discrimination will count them in, I don't know)

Being eastern-European myself I can confirm that while the negative stuff applies, the positive doesn't.

But I say let them - I'm honestly curious what the end result of such policies will be.

[madrafi]

I thought Visa sponsorship was the issue for third-world countries,I and many of my friends (local code meetup) share the same story ; apply to 150+ companies and not a single response. We are white from North-Africa. I stopped applying abroad because these kind of "diversity" policies scare me because they're mostly ethnic based I believe it should be idea based otherwise you end up with a group that all think alike.

[i_am_proteus]

> We use inclusive definitions of “women” and “female” and welcome trans women, genderqueer women, and non-binary people who are female-identified.

If you are interested in the program, it seems like you could identify yourself as female and apply. Especially if there's no in-person interview.

Cynically, if enough [biological males who identify as] men elect to identify as women for this application, the selection team will have some very difficult decisions to make.

[fzeroracer]

This is a great way to get a company to instantly reject you at the interview step if they have one or fired shortly after being hired.

Because, you know, most companies look up the profile of candidates on LinkedIn, social media etc. Unless you actually consider yourself transgender, you would quickly be caught and removed just as quickly.

[navigatesol]

>Unless you actually consider yourself transgender, you would quickly be caught and removed just as quickly.

In the current cultural zeitgeist it'd be unimaginable to see someone get fired because they didn't conform to someone's rules of "transgender enough" based on their social media profile.

This is both the beauty and the irony of said zeitgeist; make all the rules you want, can't stop someone from playing.

[menacingly]

And let's not forget the very real cases where someone may be more comfortable telling a bootcamp something about themselves than _the entire world_ on social media

[fzeroracer]

Yes, you can actually. These sort of arguments remind me of the transgender bathroom fears: What's stopping a man from pretending to be transgender in order to enter the woman's bathroom?

Well, the answer is that people that are transgender will have a history of being transgender or acting in such a way that confirms they consider themselves that gender. So any lawsuit as a result of this would look into your past, see that you lied about being transgender and make it an open and shut case. If that case became public then you could say goodbye to your job prospects.

[malvosenior]

You either accept that people can choose their own gender or you don't. People don't get to police the reason someone may identify as female or male. History on social media should have nothing to do with it. Do you think everyone makes this choice at an early age and broadcasts it publicly?

[QualityReboot]

That's not exactly right.

As I understand it, you sort of get to choose your gender, but society has to accept your choice.

If I declare myself a woman but make no attempt to "live as a woman" as society sees it, I'll appear to be taking advantage of the system, and my choice will be rejected and there will be social consequences.

Conversely, if I do appear to be making an honest attempt to be a woman, and you don't accept it because of your conservative values, then you cannot reject my choice, because that's bigoted.

Yes, you can change your mind about your gender, but you really need to do it in a life-upending way that feels risky and permanent and committed, then you'll be celebrated. If you phone it in, people are going to be offended and you'll be rejected.

[fzeroracer]

It's weird that you bring this up in a comment thread about someone literally advocating for lying about their gender for the sake of some perceived competitive advantage.

Do you believe this to be ethical? Because to me I find it rather offensive considering it harms actual transgender candidates.

[strken]

There is a level of salary discrepancy where I would transition and start living as a woman, probably somewhere around the point of women earning 50 to 60% more. I'm not even sure it would be a lie; gender is pretty unimportant to me, and at some point the potential gains overcome inertia and habit.

[klohto]

I'm seeing this as well and it isn't in any way positive experience. There is not much we can do without being labeled.

[rosege]

I don't live in USA but a couple of years back I was working for a large financial organization in my country and was flat out told don't even think you are getting promoted because we need to lift our diversity so no white men will be promoted.

I left not too long after that.

[tth3uoku]

I have applied for women's scholarships but not without feeling guilty. Why do I get a chance at something while as many eager men in need of financial assistance or technical mentorship do not?

I am appreciative of every opportunity I have been given and will continue to take advantage of any opportunity afforded to me, even if it is on the base of my gender. If an investor wants to help a certain group of people, I will value that they are providing opportunities even though I may disagree with the idea of providing opportunities based on immutable characteristics.

[commandlinefan]

I'm a white man, and sometimes I fear that the best thing I ever did for my son was give him Hispanic heritage through his mother.

[identity-haver]

My plan would be to send my kids to dual language programs. If you're a somewhat native Spanish speaker, you can claim to be Hispanic with a clear conscience. "Hispanic" is, legally speaking (for now), an "ethnicity", not a race, which means it is independent of blood (but apparently race is a "socio-political construct" according to the US Census). People are already doing this, plus the people with one Mexican grandparent or something.

This farcical system can't go on forever as is. Either racial preferences in hiring will be banned under the 14th amendment, or the US will adopt a Brazil-style racial preference system, where they will actually test your blood and have technicians measure the tone of your skin and the shape of your face in order to fit you into a category.

[WeakLanguage]

I'm in the same situation.

I've already resigned myself that I must tell him to always check those minority boxes and he may want to consider only using his mother's surname on his resume, instead of the traditional dual surname he legally has (Example: Lopez, instead of Smith Lopez).

[mywittyname]

> I honestly don’t see how any of this is legal

It is illegal to discriminate for jobs on the basis of sex in the US (as per the Civil Rights Act of 1964). If you believe yourself to be the victim of discrimination, then submit a complaint the the EEOC [1] who will investigate.

That being said, a large gap between the number men and women (or whites and blacks, etc) working at companies exist can be considered evidence of systematic discrimination. Increasing the pool of unrepresented applicants is a great way to ensure that a diverse pool of qualified candidates get interviews, thus reduce the likelihood that a company appears to be practicing discrimination during hiring.

[1] https://www.eeoc.gov/laws/types/sex.cfm

[rubicon33]

Good luck with that complaint to the EEOC as a white man.

[astura]

The EEOC absolutely investigates discrimination against white males.

https://www.eeoc.gov/eeoc/initiatives/e-race/caselist.cfm#re...

[rubicon33]

I never said it's not possible. I said good luck. Pointing out a handful of cases hardly proves that they're given the same level of consideration.

[wolco]

I can accept either point but not both.

It is illegal to discriminate based on sex.

By not discriminating based on sex to fix a ratio/percent you could be found discriminating

[mywittyname]

Statistically speaking, an equal opportunity workforce should be comprised of some demographic makeup. If a company deviates dramatically from that target makeup, the implication is that hiring practices are unfair. Addressing the unfairness will cause the issue to naturally correct itself.

This is a sound strategy that's commonly applied to other areas of engineering. If a company produces bearings and their QA department measures bearing tolerances from a shipment sample to deviate wildly from what is expected, then the implication is their is an issue with the manufacturing process that needs to be addressed. They don't just toss a handful of under-tolerant bearing in the shipment to bring the median value inline.

In other words:

> By not discriminating based on sex to fix a ratio/percent

...Is where your misunderstanding is. This idea is not over-correction -- you do no need to discriminate to achieve a specific makeup. You explicitly need to NOT discriminate and the problem will be correct itself.

ELI5: If a company was found to have a workforce that was too short. An appropriate response is to notice the problem an conduct an investigation, which determines tall people were put off from applying because the doors were too short. They correct the doors and the average height of employees naturally correct.

A wrong approach is to explicitly weight taller people more favorable in interviews.

[Scea91]

What is the desired demographic makeup? Is it 50:50? Should it be across all professions?

[pathseeker]

>working at companies exist can be considered evidence of systematic discrimination.

No it can't unless you show that there are an equal number of qualified candidates, which there aren't in tech. CS grad rates for women are much lower.

[lixtra]

Please don’t forget that it is her private money (I don’t know about tax benefits). So it’s like paying for the education of your children.

[deogeo]

Inheritance is also private money, yet this case in Canada shows race/sexuality/gender-conditions in a will getting overturned: https://globalnews.ca/news/2533006/ontario-court-rejects-sch...

[zimablue]

Except it's not your children, it's your arbitrary fashion-based tribal identity. (Gender isn't a fashion choice, no, but the choice to focus on gender over height, good looks, class, race, etc is very much a fashion that quickly shifts).

[Townley]

I'm sympathetic to anyone who's had a challenging job search, and am glad that you found something.

Society is worse off for having barriers that prevent anyone who wants to code from being able to do so. That includes the inefficiencies of the job industry not placing you into a productive coding role faster. But it also includes the lower salaries, lack of support/representation, belittling, and near-universal campaign of horrible harassment that every woman I've talked to in the field has experienced.

Everyone in the field of software development struggles, and I don't want to take away from that. We should be making life easier for everyone. But doing so involves recognizing problems specifically and succinctly, and building solutions that fit those problems. One of society's many problems is that women in tech have to contend with a nightmarish swirl of negative distractions that I've never had to think about as a white man. In the face of such a problem, giving resources to the effected population makes total sense, and it's a good thing that more organizations/companies are doing so. Even more than that, it brings us closer to meritocratic equality.

[malvosenior]

Women are in extremely high demand in the tech industry. This post is just another example of a benefit women get but men don't. As a hiring manager I can say I've definitely been encouraged to pay women more than equally equipped men because their presence on the team is deemed so valuable.

[fizwhiz]

How did you leverage your ethnicity to get a competitive advantage in your job search?

[rosterface]

Without doxing myself...

It’s not apparently obvious what ethnicity I am based on looks. I had already been told there was a focus on diversity at the company I ended up getting an offer at and they “really want to build a diverse team from the ground up”. The conversation had been dragging for months and I resisted bringing up my background out of principle. I saw the hiring manager tweeting about a Latinx conference (I hate that term) and bit the bullet and told them I’m Latinx. I had an offer by the end of the week. This was after months of similar discussions with other companies where I stuck to my ideal of being hired for what I’ve accomplished and the skills I can prove I have. Ultimately I was running out of money and got desperate. I still feel terrible and angry but I have to put food on the table.

[fizwhiz]

Thanks for being honest about your experience. Though I wouldn't be surprised if you get downvoted for your unencumbered authenticity because it doesn't match the narrative du jour.

Edit: it does seem like you're being downvoted. I predict manfredo's response will be next[1]. Sigh.

[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19464944

[basura9999]

I've been in the same situation and I cringe about it. I am a Latino but white because I am from Argentina where people are mostly from European backgrounds. It seems that "Latino" is meant to mean a specific group of Latinos actually and not the whites ones but technically with the word "Latino" I also qualify. But I would like to hear them tell me to my face why I am not a Latino.

[sergiotapia]

Asquerosa la situacion, pero entiendo porque lo hiciste. Latinx es un termino gringo que me hace cagar de riza lol. Por el culo, somos Latinos y Latinas. No LaTiNX.

[Kye]

I'm not surprised nonbinary Latinx people hear the same talk about the terms they ask people to use for them. I wasn't sure about Latinx, but now I'm firmly for it.

[malvosenior]

That's a really odd reaction to have when a bunch of Hispanics tell you they find the term offensive.

[umanwizard]

The preferred term is "gringx", please...

[Yetanfou]

This can only end when customers - from individuals to corporations - finally get fed up with the identity politics employed by these 'diversity' advocates and start shunning companies which profess adherence to this mantra. If this does not happen it will end when diversity has run its course and the population has been balkanised into nothing but oppressors and oppressed with the average size of the oppressed community being a single individual. Since by that time the economy will have ground to a halt they'll be fighting each other with sticks and stones.

[jordigh]

> I honestly don’t see how any of this is legal

Let me help you, fellow Mexican:

https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/CFR-2017-title29-vol4/xm...

The reason it's legal is because there are laws that explicitly allow this for certain underrepresented or disadvantaged groups.

Espero que esto aclare tus dudas.

[atom-morgan]

A legal justification doesn't make something right.

It's also worth mentioning why the term "underrepresented minority" or "underrepresented group" is need in the first place. Considering how sexist and racist people claim tech is Asians seem to be doing perfectly fine which is exactly why the term URM is needed in the first place.

[jordigh]

The question was just about the legality of it. It's not a mystery why it's legal and people should be aware of what the laws actually are.

[commandlinefan]

> The question was just about the legality of it

So somebody asked "how can this be legal" and your answer was "because it's a law" and you're actually trying to claim the moral high ground?

[umanwizard]

Do you live in the US? If so, I think this is a bit exaggerated. There are still a lot of white men from the US at all major tech companies.

[ddayz]

Similar scenario that was sadly disturbing. It is quite advantageous to have an ethnic origin as a Pacific Islander.

However some people I have met from southern Asia coming from a farming family background likely have had much worse conditions growing up. But they get lumped into the Asian mass where you must truly excel to get noticed.

[lallysingh]

I suspect it'll end when people aren't surprised to hear things like this:

https://hbswk.hbs.edu/item/minorities-who-whiten-job-resumes...

[fzeroracer]

I have never encountered this overt screening against white men as a white man.

Do you have any statistical evidence that proves white men are being discriminated against?

[zeropnc]

Yeah this stuff is getting pretty absurd. Someday in the future we’ll have grants for ugly people or short people because every little inequality must be erased in the human collective.

[yters]

We should have grants for unemployed people because they are underrepresented in companies.

[jakelazaroff]

We never really valued skills over demographics — it's just much less visible where it benefits a dominant group. Consider that the percentage of VC deals with female-founded companies is 5.4% and yet they receive only 2.2% of VC dollars [1]. This has held true for over a decade: the average female founders have received less than their average male counterparts. But for some reason, there aren't many people complaining that VCs are giving men money just because they're men!

[1] http://fortune.com/2019/01/28/funding-female-founders-2018/

[pacala]

Never heard of an open and blatant 'women need not apply' in the 20 years I've been in the US. Not in the universities, not in the workplace, not anywhere. Not sure about NFL policies, though there aren't that many 6 foot 250 pounds fit women out there. Pretty sure there is no VC advertising 'we will fund no women' out there, if it were there would be a huge press coverage.

And yet, the OP is openly and blatant 'men need not apply'. How is that ever OK?

[commandlinefan]

> an open and blatant 'women need not apply'

If anything, it's been the other way around for at least as long as I've been alive.

[jpindar]

The NFL does allow women to apply, and one has tried, though that appeared to be just a publicity stunt.

There are a few women who play college football, and they are eligible to apply in the more traditional manner. With college experience and professional coaching it's not completely impossible that they could make it, probably as kickers or punters, who don't need as much upper body strength as other positions.

[jakelazaroff]

My point is, blatantly saying "X need not apply" isn't any worse than saying "this opportunity is open to both X and Y" and then only accepting Y. Implicit discrimination isn't somehow better than explicit.

[pacala]

If I read this correctly, what you're saying is:

* Implicit discrimination is bad. I'm saying: To use that as a guide for your actions you need to have an implicit discrimination detector able to account for all the confounding variables.

* Explicit discrimination is also bad. I'm saying: As a corollary, there should not be explicit 'X need not apply' policies.

* Two wrongs make a right.

[lallysingh]

Because men have many other options. If it was just 1 or 2 places saying 'we won't fund women', then those places don't substantially affect womens' ability to get funded. But that isn't the case.

[ng12]

> Consider that the percentage of VC deals with female-founded companies is 5.4% and yet they receive only 2.2% of VC dollars

Stats like this are so useless. Obviously if males make up 95% of the pool they're more likely to have founded some of the unicorns, therefore skewing the average. If one of the 5% of females founded a unicorn I bet they'd have a greater share of VC dollars.

[jakelazaroff]

The reason that companies become unicorns is that VCs invest in them at a certain valuation. You have cause and effect reversed. If VCs are underinvesting in female-founded companies, it's entirely expected that fewer of those companies will become unicorns.

[ng12]

I'm not talking about cause and effect, I'm talking about a lazy misapplication of statistics to bolster a talking point.

[jakelazaroff]

How can you separate them? Lack of female-founded unicorns is a direct consequence of underinvestment in female-founded companies.