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."

Comments

Waste of money

[aglider]

If you don't understand the problem first, there will be no real solution later. Why don't we have "diversity"?

Re:Waste of money

[jythie]

I don't know, it is hard to go wrong with scholarships. It may not address underlying issues, but it will get more people into the pipeline that might not have been able to otherwise, which means more mentors and role models down the road. A crude solution, but still stands a chance to do some good.

Re: Waste of money

[Anonymous Coward]

Oh, what, there's no politically correct way to say things that are sexist bullshit? I wonder why that is.

Re:Waste of money

[Nemyst]

It also further exacerbates jealousy and a feeling of inequality from the disgusting straight white males (do I need to add more adjectives there?) we keep bashing. Perhaps this'll come as a shock, but not all white males are rich. By having a scholarship for pretty much every state of being but white males, you're going to segregate the people who already love what they're doing and do it because of that in spite of the monetary problems. You're telling them that they're not worth fussing over.

Re:Waste of money

[jythie]

True, not all white males are rich, but all other things being equal, they still get preferential treatment when it comes to jobs, career advancement, internships, etc. That tends to be the problem with invisible privilege, it is not absolute so it can be hard for individuals (who will always have others better off than themselves) to see it even exists, and thus any help that does not include them feels like a loss. In fact it often gets wrapped up in entitlement, the feeling that whatever they do get they simply deserve thus it is not an advantage and giving other people a leg up is undeserved.

But yes, it will further exacerbate jealousy, there is not much you can do about that outside sliding back or going as far as returning to 'only white protestant land owning ethnically local males are legally people' system, which naturally then you had jealousy in other directions. But as long as a dominant group with a diverse membership sees others rising, there will be jealousy and they feeling that they should be better off than they are and if those uppity minorities were not in the way they would be wealthier within their own demographic. Even though they would not actually be. Ok, I tangented quite a bit ther ^_^

Re: Waste of money

[FrnkMit]

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. (Source) From the article: "... families were much more likely to buy computers for boys than for girls — even when their girls were really interested in computers."

So it's quite probable women WOULD go into tech fields ... if they had encouragement, a pleasant working atmosphere, and at least some assurance that motherhood wouldn't throw them completely off their career track.

Re: Waste of money

[kaliann]

Nursing is hard. Veterinary medicine is hard. Biological sciences, particularly at the graduate level, are hard.
All of these are heavily female dominated.

Women don't avoid hard fields simply because there is challenging material.

It's almost like the situation is more complex than "Tech is just too tough for delicate ladybrains".

Re:Waste of money

[njnnja]

Unfortunately it's a small chance. Most of the difference in interest/ability/selection/whatever in STEM by gender is already evident by the end of high school. Too lazy to look it up now, but you can look at things like math SAT scores, AP calculus scores, intended major selection, etc. and see that there is already a pretty significant difference between the sexes already. And it's already so big that it doesn't really get bigger over time. Since a stitch in time saves nine, it seems like the best use of scarce resources would be to try to deal with whatever is happening in high school (or even middle school) where the discrepancies start.

Note that this doesn't depend on settling whether the difference is nature or nurture, just that you can see the difference in a bunch of 18 year old kids. So solutions that address the concerns of 20 and 30 year olds, however worthy they may be in and of themselves, seem to be forever swimming against the current.

Re: Waste of money

[Penguinisto]

...and at least some assurance that motherhood wouldn't throw them completely off their career track.

And therein lies the rub. Unless he mandates a hysterectomy before hiring at Intel, that biological clock will be there, ticking. There isn't shit that you (or the Intel Corporation) can do about it, either. I know quite a few women in tech (including Intel employees) - the highly successful ones are childless, and have no inclination of having kids (the only exception is a former manager of mine - and she has an MBA, not a CompSci degree). The reason why? They forewent the child-rearing thing and went all-in when it came to technology - just like the guys do.

When you bear a child, your priorities change - hard. All the sudden, that project/application/datacenter/whatever doesn't seem so damned important anymore, and your life's focus changes. It's not sexist to say that women in general are affected by this a hell of a lot more than men are. Guys are generally used to sucking it up and getting on with the business of focusing back on that whole hunter-gatherer thing - it's how we're wired. There are exceptions in either direction of course, but they're not the general rule. Generally, the business of getting that little snot factory raised, educated, nurtured, and prepared for the world becomes a woman's focus much quicker than it does for a guy.

Even with compromises (day care, schools, etc), it still changes the top priority for most (not all - most) women. This in turn throws the statistics off pretty hard for careers that require constant education and constant renewal.

Re: Waste of money

[Anonymous Coward]

You mean hard wired to sacrifice themselves to take care of their family?

Re: Waste of money

[Penguinisto]

That's the thing - it isn't that they put their careers "over" their families - they do it because of their families. That woolly mammoth isn't gonna kill itself, you know (or the modern equivalent? 'That mortgage ain't gonna pay itself.')

Most guys would love to stay home all day and help raise the kids, enjoying every moment - instead they have to get out there and make double-damned certain that the wife and kids were provided for, and kept secure, safe, fed, and warm. That's the hard-wiring I'm talking about. Some guys manage to do it (e.g. stay-at-home dads) - good for them! (no, really - I'd be totally envious of such a situation.) Most guys however don't get to do that - they have to get out there and work for the long haul, for the family.

That's why I specifically wrote "sucking it up" - not because they want to, but because they have to.

Re:Waste of money

[malkavian]

Ok, and let's get equal leave for paternity, money spent getting males into Vetinary sciences etc. where they're underrepresented, and a whole host of things that are directed at women. Plus, the same chance of being the stay at home partner when children arrive (males are vastly under represented here. Oh, and compulsory genetic testing at childbirth (so every male will have the same knowledge that the child is theirs as the mother has), so on, so forth.. But you know what, a male will never have the same bond with a child as the mother, because that's biologically impossible. What's the big picture here? The sexes aren't equal in all things; one sex has advantages in some areas. People make their own choices along the way. This insistence that there must be equal everything at each step, and that the company must have x people in post to match a general demographic of population by discriminating based on sex or skin colour is atrocious. I'm all for meritocracy (hell, my hiring practices of the past decade have had me hiring in approximately 50% ethnic minorities, as they were flat out the best candidates for the job that presented at interviews). This "discriminate against one group so we can get a demographic match up" is just plain silly.

Re:Waste of money

[a whoabot]

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"

Re: Waste of money

[Penguinisto]

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.

Re: Waste of money

[Penguinisto]

You confuse instinct with circumstance. Most single mothers go out there and work because circumstances say that they have to. Most two-job families see both parents working because financial circumstance demands it.

Re:Waste of money

[ShanghaiBill]

The mindset that "girls would make bad programmers ...

Nobody is saying that. What they are saying is that girls are less interested, not less capable.

Re:Waste of money

[BarbaraHudson]

Ok, and let's get equal leave for paternity

Where I live, the parents are free to divvy up the parental leave any way they wish.

money spent getting males into Vetinary sciences

The number of women who are veterinarians has only outnumbered men since 2009. The problem in IT has been going on much longer, and runs much deeper.

Plus, the same chance of being the stay at home partner when children arrive (males are vastly under represented here.

Maybe if women were able to make the same amount of money for the same experience in the same job, the numbers would be better. Also, there's nothing to prevent from doing this - it's something that should have been discussed before having kids.

Oh, and compulsory genetic testing at childbirth (so every male will have the same knowledge that the child is theirs as the mother has)

Sure, if we can also have a global database so that when men cheat and get another woman pregnant, their significant other is also notified so she can decide whether she wants to throw the bum out.

But you know what, a male will never have the same bond with a child as the mother, because that's biologically impossible.

[citation needed]

What's the big picture here? The sexes aren't equal in all things; one sex has advantages in some areas. People make their own choices along the way.

Part of the problem is that women "choose" to leave certain industries because they are paid less for the same job with the same experience and the same qualifications.

Re: Waste of money

[ShanghaiBill]

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.

Re:Waste of money

[a whoabot]

I have read the paper many times, thank you for trying to belittle me. I was objecting to your particular claim that women are paid less for the same work. Now you are raising completely different points about men and women doing DIFFERENT work. I don't deny that men and women do different work and that societal expectations about gender roles is the primary cause of this. I fully agree with that.

There were many claims that women were being paid less for the same work. The Department had a legal obligation to prevent this as a civil rights issue, so they tried to discover what exactly was happening. They could not determine that such a thing was happening. Of course, every economist was saying the same thing: Investors almost universally invest in the highest expected return. If women were doing the same work for less pay, investors would invest in firms that primarily or solely used women as workers, thus increasing demand, and pay, until an equilibrium is reached.

The final conclusion: "As a result, it is not possible now, and doubtless will never be possible, to determine reliably whether any portion of the observed gender wage gap is not attributable to factors that compensate women and men differently on socially acceptable bases, and hence can confidently be attributed to overt discrimination against women. In addition, at a practical level, the complex combnation of factors that collectively determine wages pad to different individuals makes the formulation of policy that will reliably redress ay overt discrimination that does exist a task that is, at least, daunting and, more likely, unachievable." (pg. 36)

The Department of Labor has not done an equivalent study since this 2009 one.

Re: Waste of money

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes it is funny. Except it isn't. It's just more of the same thinking that when a women does it, she's a hero... when a man does it, he's a self serving pig or whatever he is labeled as for whatever 'it' is in a given discussion.

Guy codes? Must be a smelly fat hot pocket eating misogynist hater living in mom's basement.
Girl codes? She rocks, go girl power!

Male teacher bangs student? Male and female alike want his nuts cut off.
Female teacher does the same? Well, the boy was lucky... where were female teachers like that when I was a boy?!

Man hits woman? Omg, the cruelty.
Woman hits man? He's a big pussy if he can't take it...

Oh and look at this...

Man works 2 jobs (or longer hours) to support family, he's a self serving prick that fails at commitment, is avoiding his kids, etc...
Woman does it? Well, she's just a hero.

and so on, and so on... It's like women want to be both the victim and the hero for the exact same activity depending on which gender does it. /boggle

And so on and so forth....

Re: Waste of money

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes, it's a bit more complex, but not much. Cross culturally (thus not a social construct), Females are more extroverted and males more introverted. Females in general prefer socially oriented jobs and shy away from jobs that reduce or eliminate social life.

40 years of feminism, and not ONE study they've done attempts to disprove the null hypothesis? It's quite simple. Instead of assuming sexism, all we have to do is poll the people and find out what they actually enjoy doing. From the employment rates it appears female dominated fields are things like teaching, heathcare, therapists, social workers, etc. Where is the outrage that there are very few men in teaching?

It would be absurd to assume that one of the body's largest and most important organs, the brain, was immune to the same sexual dimophism that gave us our different bodies and sexual organs. The answer is obvious to anyone: Women and Men ARE different, and this hurts Social Justice Warriors' feelings so they have censored it from scientific journals thus leading to medical risks.

Re:Waste of money

[StikyPad]

We already know what happens in middle and high school: social pressure to fit in, and follow socially accepted roles, where "socially accepted" is defined, in large part, by underage peers. Being a "nerdy engineer" is socially acceptable for men because it provides the opportunity to make a pretty good living, which makes them socially desirable as a mate. There's little of the same incentive for women, who aren't ranked as much in desirability by their salary -- despite the fact that women under 30 are actually earning more than men anyway. Men are more easily incentivized by monetary rewards because money gives us status, and status makes us desirable. We gain more benefit from money than having money. Until there are external rewards beyond monetary compensation for women, they probably aren't going to start flocking to engineering programs.

But to echo the GP, honestly, equality means equality, not special treatment. If we need to make efforts to get more women in science and technology, then we also need to make efforts to get women into construction (97% men), soldiering (84% men), and manufacturing (72% men), and efforts to get men into healthcare (78% women), education (69% women), and social work (73% women). I'm all for equal opportunity, as best as possible, and we can certainly make improvements in that area, especially for economically disadvantaged people, of which single mothers are a significant part. That said, I'm not at all convinced, and have seen no empirical evidence that there's an objective problem with gender representation that doesn't mirror the general population.

And men aren't necessarily driving the division either. For example, women prefer a male boss even more than men do. Has anyone bothered to ask them how interested they are in science and technology? And if results show that they aren't, then why are we (collectively) trying to tell them that their preferences are wrong? That seems like the opposite of empowerment to me.

Re: Waste of money

[LynnwoodRooster]

So how do you explain all those single moms who manage to do both?

Disclaimer: I was brought up by a single mother...

The truth is, the vast, VAST majority do no such thing. They typically have others (friends, daycare, relatives) take care of the kids during the day/afternoon/evening whilst mom is working. They are "out of the picture" as much as a father who goes to work to earn money and comes home at night to spend time with the family, eat, and sleep. The concept of a "hero-mom" who works 8+ hours a day AND is home for the kids all the time is a highly-flawed one.

Re:Waste of money

[a whoabot]

What are you talking about? You said I never bothered to read the paper. I did. You simply used a scurrilous personal attack against me. It has nothing to do with who chose what.

None of the links you gave say that they are paid less for the same work. They are talking about women being paid less in toto.

Women's employment earnings are less than men. No one is denying this. That is totally different claim from the incredible one you originally made: That women are paid less for the very same work.

"And the paper did not say that it wasn't happening"

This is an incredible argument. Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence. You need POSITIVE proof that women are paid less for the same work, not innuendo or faith. The Department of Labor, which has a duty to deal with these issues, did the most thorough investigation ever, and concluded that there was no evidence.

Hire the best person

[master_kaos]

How about hiring the best person for the job, and fits well with the rest of the team regardless of gender, race, religion, sexual preference, etc? If it happens to be someone who is white, hispanic, or black who cares?

Re:Hire the best person

[Anonymous Coward]

That would be great, but it is not PC, while discrimination that favours people belonging to groups that were previously discriminated against is.

Re:Hire the best person

[halivar]

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.

Re:Hire the best person

[fey000]

How about hiring the best person for the job, and fits well with the rest of the team regardless of gender, race, religion, sexual preference, etc? If it happens to be someone who is white, hispanic, or black who cares?

Because then you'll be approached by a frothing at the mouth "journalist", asking questions like "Why isn't your workforce 50% white, 50% asian, 50% black, , 50% hispanic, 50% homosexual, and 50% female?".

Hiring the best suited candidate is so 1990. Now it's all about the progressive stack and checking your privilege.

Re:Hire the best person

[serviscope_minor]

Quota driven diversity just makes the bigots right.

No on two counts. Firstly it only matters if everything is already equal. Secondly no matter what quotas exist, women are not de-facto inferior to men (or any other bias you choose to discuss).

If you hire based on attributes other than competence, then people having those attributes will, on average, be less competent than their colleagues without those attributes.

Indeed so: no disagreement there. However, the claim is that is ALREADY happening, with people discounting (e.g.) women in favour of men.

http://blogs.scientificamerica...

And 60% of college students are female

[Anonymous Coward]

What are we doing to combat the critical under representation of men in college?

Re:And 60% of college students are female

[Anonymous Coward]

Careful, the Feminazis are watching.

Re:And 60% of college students are female

[BobSutan]

Well, the first thing we need is a leadership that doesn't actually _celebrate_ men being worse off in college:

http://pjmedia.com/tatler/2012...

"“In fact, more women as a whole now graduate from college than men,” Obama wrote. “This is a great accomplishment—not just for one sport or one college or even just for women but for America. And this is what Title IX is all about.”"

The article continues...

"So if a 17% deficit was a catastrophe requiring federal intervention, what are we to conclude when that same federal intervention has created a 25% level of inequality?"

This is a good question, when women had a 17% deficit the govt enacted a host of laws to balance things out, to include Title IX. Now that there's a 25% deficit for men, where's the action to fix things? It'd be bad enough it was just crickets, but instead our president is lauding this even GREATER deficit than what women suffered. In what way does that make any sense?

And yes, federal intervention most certainly has made colleges more inhospitable to men. Case in point, the Dear Colleague letter and the kangaroo courts that have followed.

Re:discrimination in reverse

[Roodvlees]

No it means that you are currently positively discriminated.
If anything changes in hiring practices it's less positive discrimination and more active searching for candidates that are a minority. Instead of only actively searching for white and asian males because you happen to know candidates like that.

5 stages of handling a PR problem

[John Jorsett]

1. Profess shock 2. Start an investigation 3. Promise to do better 4. Apologize and abase yourself to every aggrieved group you can find 5. Throw some money at anything related, esp. self-appointed "community spokesmen"

Looks like Intel has hit stage 5.

delusion

[Trailer Trash]

"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.

What this REALLY means

[DoofusOfDeath]

I'll bet they're outsourcing $300M of work o India and China. Best spin ever!

Comment removed

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Re:why the hate

[fey000]

What is it about wanting to introduce more people into IT that gets people into a blind spitting rage? It doesn't have to be a zero-sum game guys.
Maybe its the gross unwelcoming attitude that puts people off.

Because a lot of people have worked damn hard to get somewhere and to build something. And all of that effort is being diminished to no small extent by this preferred treatment program.

If you work your ass of for 10 years, making sure to be the best, only to get passed by for a rookie on a "diversity" quota, wouldn't you get a little grumpy? That is why so many here are asking for the 'best candidate' treatment rather than the 'look how minority I am' treatment. That is why yet another of these "diversity" programs is viewed with no small amount of suspicion and apprehension.

Intel being Intel *might* be able to do something smart, but given the organizations that they have partnered with for the drive, it is very very unlikely that anything other than feminazi rabies will come out of it. And that sucks for everyone on the planet.

Re:Asian men - not a minority?

[Anonymous Coward]

Why don't Asian men count as a minority?

Because they accept responsibility for themselves and actually work to succeed, and don't blame others - especially whitey - when they fail.

Can't have that, now can we?

Why only in Tech?

[fey000]

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.

Re:Why only in Tech?

[Dixie_Flatline]

The CEO of Intel can't affect those industries, except, perhaps, indirectly and through example.

All of those are good questions. Those are all places where we should be striving to see a better mix of genders and races. You tell ME why those industries aren't trying to change. Could it be the institutional sexism that's so pervasive in our culture, starting when children are young, allotting toys on a gendered basis? Is it because we don't discourage construction workers in many of our cities from catcalling really offensive things, making women wonder why they'd ever want to work on a site like that? Is it because when women DO go into the armed forces, they're raped or sexually assaulted at distressingly high rates? Is it because we tell men that caring for children is women's work, and simultaneously tell them it's a horrible thing to be feminine?

By the time someone is looking for a job, it's probably too late. The people that want to be in construction have already made their choice, male or female.

Re:Why only in Tech?

[robkeeney]

Don't forget HR. It's absolutely dominated by women. In nearly 20 years, I don't think I've ever worked with a male HR staffer. Why is that?

Re:why the hate

[serviscope_minor]

If you work your ass of for 10 years, making sure to be the best, only to get passed by for a rookie on a "diversity" quota,

Is that any different from working your ass off for 10 years, making sure to be the best only to get passed by because you're not a man? Is it possible for science to identify bias using a randomized, controlled trial?

Why yes!

http://blogs.scientificamerica...

So the thing is you're assuming everything is equal and therefore quotas are hurting men. The thing is that they're not equal and women are demonstrably being passed over in favour of men simply by vitrue of not being male.

So what do you think should be done. Unless you have a good rebuttal for that study, something is clearly messed up.

Re: Asian men - not a minority?

[Anonymous Coward]

Why don't native Americans count as minorities? How much of that $300 million will go to native American schools? What are their Native American employment numbers?

nobody cares about diversity. They care about not looking bad. White people don't like racism, so Intel has to look like they don't either. Black people are constantly whining about all the things they don't have, so Intel caters to them. Meanwhile, native Americans are forgotten, again.

Re:Produce More Qualified Workers to Not Hire

[Dixie_Flatline]

Something that helps a lot (in all industries, including academia) is stripping names and gender/race identifying characteristics from resumes and papers. When those documents are assessed in a context absent the nature of the writer, they're considered more equally. They've done experiments where the same paper has been submitted with male, female and neutral names, and the female names see more critical judgement and a higher rate of rejection. This is for exactly the same paper, remember.

The problem isn't overt racism, it's subtle, institutional discrimination that most of us suffer from. Even female researchers and professors are guilty of discriminating against other women.

Re:discrimination in reverse

[thesandtiger]

I'll say it:

All other things (education, experience, interview, etc.) being equal or close enough between two candidates, one of them being a white male and the other being someone in a racial or gender minority class, yeah, I'm going to hire the person in the racial or gender minority class.

It isn't for a metric - it's because, all other things being equal as you stipulated, a person from a class not normally found in the field is likely going to have had to overcome obstacles and challenges on the way there that the other candidate has not.
Let's look at some reasons why the minority candidate who is otherwise equal to the non-minority candidate is the better pick:

1) In every single discussion of diversity in tech on Slashdot, people will trot out REASONS why minorities don't do well in tech: Black people don't do well because they get called out by their friends and families for acting white if they go to school. Women don't because they get called out by other women for being in such a nerdy profession. Etc. etc. etc. If that is true, then yes, I want the candidate who has demonstrated persistence and determination in the face of hostility. They will be use to adversity and overcoming it, and as a hiring manager I will want that in a candidate.

2) In every single discussion of diversity in tech on Slashdot, people will trot out BIOTRUTHS about women and minorities and why they are not well represented in tech. If that's true, then yes, I absolutely want the candidate who is exceptional and defies their biology to have somehow managed to be equal to the non-minority candidate. There's more potential for them to be exceptional in other ways, and as a hiring manager, I want exceptional people.

3) If everything else is equal, why NOT hire the candidate who will also improve an arbitrary metric? As a hiring manager, I want to not have to have people crawling up my ass telling me to do things just so the team looks better, and this would reduce one more thing people could crawl up my ass about.

So yeah, unless you're a fucking idiot, hire the atypical candidate when they are literally close enough to equal that flipping a coin would be the only "fair" way to determine who to hire. Duh?

More PC nonsense

[erp_consultant]

What a surprise...yet another company jumps on the politically correct bandwagon. It seems that the strategy is to jump out ahead of this "issue" rather than wait for some shake down artist like Al Sharpton to come knocking on your door.

The quotes around "issue" are intentional, indicating that there is no issue at all. The reason that there is a lower representation in Tech is simply that there are fewer applicants that are Black or female or from other minority groups. Simple as that. All you have to do is take a walk around a college campus and visit a CS101 class. What will you see? Predominantly white males and asians. Is that because colleges are discriminating against others in their CS programs? Of course not. It just means that those people chose to study other things.

If Intel wants to give money to historically black colleges that's great. I'm all in favor of that. But to suggest that it will fix some supposed problem is ridiculous. In typical American fashion, the solution to every problem is to throw more money at it. It rarely works. To blame companies for "not hiring enough people from group X" is certainly convenient, and probably popular in some circles, but in the end its not accurate.

Companies hire from the pool of labor that is available to them. To suggest that they are overlooking qualified people because of the color of their skin or their gender is absurd. It is nothing more than a thinly veiled racism/sexism charge to which there is no substantial evidence to support it.

Quite frankly, there is more evidence to support discrimination based on age or medical health than age or gender. Where is the outrage over that? Where are all the big companies promising to throw all sorts of money to address it? Crickets.

Re:why the hate

[frank_adrian314159]

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.