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Intel Pledges $300 Million To Improve Diversity In Tech
AmiMoJo writes: Intel CEO Brian Krzanich announced plans to improve diversity not just at Intel, but in the wider tech industry. Krzanich wants "to reach full representation at all levels" of the company by 2020. For instance, Intel's workforce is currently four percent black; if the company were to adjust its numbers to reflect the number of qualified workers in the tech industry, that number would increase to about six percent.
To help address one of tech's underlying diversity problems — that there are fewer qualified women and minorities available to hire than there are white or Asian men — Krzanich pledged to spend $300 million over the next three years. According to the New York Times, much of that money will be allocated "to fund engineering scholarships and to support historically black colleges and universities."
"I have two daughters of my own coming up on college age," he said to the NYT. "I want them to have a world that's got equal opportunity for them."
To help address one of tech's underlying diversity problems — that there are fewer qualified women and minorities available to hire than there are white or Asian men — Krzanich pledged to spend $300 million over the next three years. According to the New York Times, much of that money will be allocated "to fund engineering scholarships and to support historically black colleges and universities."
"I have two daughters of my own coming up on college age," he said to the NYT. "I want them to have a world that's got equal opportunity for them."
"I have two daughters of my own coming up on college age," he said to the NYT. "I want them to have a world that's got equal opportunity for them."
Yeah, I'm sure a couple of rich white girls whose father is the CEO of Intel are going to have all sorts of problems finding "equal opportunity" in the tech industry unless he acts quickly.
Do you have ESP?
I think the goal here is to try to make more women and minorities "the best person for the job" via education, which I find far more laudable than quota-driven diversity-by-fiat that degrades team and product quality.
I'm curious why this type of "diversity" drive only pops up in tech-related office jobs? Where is the drive in getting more men into child care jobs or social services? Why not more women in construction work? Why not more women in the army? Why not more women in sanitation, mining, welding, or fishing?
As it stands, it doesn't seem like diversity is the goal at all.
The Department of Labor commissioned a study on the gender pay gap. None could be determined to be caused by discrimination. They could not even conclude that there was any pay differential when all non-discriminatory factors were accounted for. "An Analysis of Reasons for the Disparity in Wages Between Men and Women"
Funny how single moms manage to do both, isn't it?
...usually because they have to, not because they want to. I was raised by a single mother who would have vastly preferred to have not had to hold a full-time job.
Quo usque tandem abutere, Nimbus, patientia nostra?
To all the people who say "women don't want to work in tech", note that women were the MAJORITY in the early days of computing, right up until the advent of personal computers.
Most of those jobs were for data entry clerks. A man would write a program with pen and paper, hand it to a woman, and then she would sit at a card punch machine and type in the program. Once personal computers became common, the man could type in his own program, the paper and pen went away, and so did the woman "tech worker".
So it's quite probable women WOULD go into tech fields ... if they had encouragement
The problem with this hypothesis is that it doesn't explain why woman have been so successful in fields like law and medicine, where they not only faced blatant discrimination, harassment, and discouragement from their peers, but also institutional barriers. Yet women fought through all of that and prevailed. So if you think that "discouragement" is the explanation, you need to explain why it only happens in tech.
Working your ass off for 10 years? Try 30 and fighting age discrimination. It has nothing to do with diversity, people of different cultures, genders, etc. If it's being supported by these companies it's all about increasing the labor supply so they can screw over their workers more easily for less money. For those of you who think otherwise, you're naive and supporting your oppressors' schemes. Employment becomes a zero-sum game if the pool of workers is growing faster than the number of open positions.
That is all.