Re:Why are women leaving the tech industry in droves?
by riskable on Friday March 06, 2015 @03:25PM
(#9159352)
I don't think your idea holds water because it is based on an assumption that women are treated poorly. Rather, more poorly than men. Is there any evidence that women are treated any worse than men in IT?
Equal opportunity is not the same thing as equal outcomes. If the culture of IT isn't appealing to women it doesn't necessarily mean sexism is involved. Sexism seems like a heck of a lot easier to overcome than, say, NIH syndrome or the fact that changing jobs is more effective at increasing pay than asking for (or relying on) raises.
Re:Why are women leaving the tech industry in droves?
by nkurz on Friday March 06, 2015 @04:59PM
(#9159862)
I was temporarily accepting this, as it's the premise of the article. My guess would be that there is considerable evidence, but little proof, and even less quantification of effect size. There certainly could be other explanations for why women would be avoiding high paying jobs for which they are qualified, but there does seem to be something about technology that is different than other demanding fields with lifestyle tradeoffs such as law and medicine.
Currently, competent American tech workers are paid very high salaries due to the lack of suitable replacements. If the size of the pool were to dramatically increase, either due to a more open immigration policy or improved gender balance, their ability to command their current salaries would decline.
It's reasonably accepted that many American workers are against an open immigration policy, and it is is possible to voice this concern in socially acceptable ways. I don't know of any socially acceptable to say the same regarding reducing the pool of competing women, but the self-benefit seems about the same.
Many of the proposed changes are directed at changing hiring practices, but it seems clearly to management's benefit to have a greater pool of qualified applicants, and no particular reason to believe that they'd pass over the opportunity to hire a qualified applicant.
But there's lots of reason to believe that an in-demand job holder would seek to keep themselves in this position. This makes me think that if you want to solve the "gender imbalance problem" in tech, it would help to make it in the self-interest of the current well-compensated employees.
How would one do this?
[1] Interestingly, the same argument applies to women currently working in tech: is it in their self-interest to have more women seeking jobs in tech? Do the women in tech consistently treat other women well?