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California May Become First State To Require Companies To Have Women On Their Boards (techcrunch.com)
Two female state senators from California are spearheading a bill to require companies to have women on their boards. "SB 826, which won Senate approval with only Democratic votes and has until the end of August to clear the Assembly, would require publicly held companies headquartered in California to have at least one woman on their boards of directors by end of next year," reports TechCrunch. "By 2021, companies with boards of five directors must have at least two women, and companies with six-member boards must have at least three women. Firms failing to comply would face a fine." From the report: "Gender diversity brings a variety of perspectives to the table that can help foster new and innovative ideas," said Democratic Sen. Hannah-Beth Jackson of Santa Barbara, who is sponsoring the bill with Senate President Pro Tem Toni Atkins of San Diego. "It's not only the right thing to do, it's good for a company's bottom line."
Yet critics of the bill say it violates the federal and state constitutions. Business associations say the rule would require companies to discriminate against men wanting to serve on boards, as well as conflict with corporate law that says the internal affairs of a corporation should be governed by the state law in which it is incorporated. This bill would apply to companies headquartered in California. [A] legislative analysis of the bill cautioned that it could get challenged on equal protection grounds, and that it would be difficult to defend, requiring the state to prove a compelling government interest in such a quota system for a private corporation.
Yet critics of the bill say it violates the federal and state constitutions. Business associations say the rule would require companies to discriminate against men wanting to serve on boards, as well as conflict with corporate law that says the internal affairs of a corporation should be governed by the state law in which it is incorporated. This bill would apply to companies headquartered in California. [A] legislative analysis of the bill cautioned that it could get challenged on equal protection grounds, and that it would be difficult to defend, requiring the state to prove a compelling government interest in such a quota system for a private corporation.
Yea Forcing Diversity in to things at the expense of people that could be more qualified has never been a bad idea.
What about companies with all female board of directors? Will they be forced to have males on board or does equality only matter when you have a vagina?
Wait a minute. I'm Hispanic. Where is the law that requires companies to have at least one Hispanic on their board? Why does the California legislature hate me?
It's about the intersectional thing now. A woman? Why not a black muslim woman? Or better yet someone who is transgender or gender fluid? That law is so behind the times. You have to be a member of a grievance group to get attention.
Sadly - this identity politics thing is fueling the rise of white nationalism. Which is another identity ground centered around grievance as well. Strangely - many far left and far right groups are in solidarity on socialism. Weird.
There's a lot of intentionally provocative/trollish bills california congress - which actually have weak effects, and are mostly pushing for industries to self-regulate, and are NOT actually expected to pass, but reach compromise.
You know, all the stuff that some folks compliment Trump on pushing as genius strategic moves.
More importantly, which a lot of these summaries (and this article) seem to gloss over - this is only for the California senate - not the US senate.
None of these things are positions asked for by Democrats in general, or even these Democrats, except as a starting point of negotiation.
Ryan Fenton
I thought we were working to make everyone treated the same?
Now, women need preference quotas to fill chairs.
Got it. I'm SURE that will give them the respect they precisely deserve.
-Styopa
Oh, that old thing? What's all that talk about "equal protection clause"?
James Damore got in trouble, because his memo said that women don't think the same way that men do.
But Sen. Hannah-Beth Jackson says, "Gender diversity brings a variety of perspectives to the table that can help foster new and innovative ideas."
So do women think differently from men, only when this difference should make you want to hire women?
I'd like men to live as long as women, and to have a suicide rate that's equally low. Can we get more funding for research (and subsidized medical care) to level the playing field? And how about criminal justice interventions which stop our prisons from being full of men?
Equality is great, unless it's applied unevenly. And frankly, I will worry about boards of directors after I worry about healthcare and unequal application of justice.
A cat can't teach a dog to bark.
Like the old adage goes - Democrat Ideas: So great that they have to be enforced.
I just did a search on the gender makeup of the California legislature, and I find only one woman for every four men. I demand gender equality within the California legislature! How dare they make such demands on corporations within their state without first making this demand upon themselves!
Here's an idea, maybe this just might work. Let's let the people of California choose who they wish to represent them in the legislature AND let corporations choose who they wish to be on their executive boards. I know, that's just crazy talk. I'm thinking it might just work out for the best though.
Here's another idea, California can pass this law and they have it get shredded to pieces in the courts. This is a step too far, it violates so many levels that make up freedom of choice and equal protection under the law.
Here's some other "equality" laws that California should consider. I believe that there are too many Democrats in the legislature, we should have a law that all political parties need to be represented equally. Let's also have racial equality in the legislature. We should also work on equality of time served in the legislature. If this "equality" is good for business then it is good for government, no?
I am armed because I am free. I am free because I am armed.
There are fewer women on boards not becuse women are less intelligent but because there are fewer of them at the top of corporations , fewer of them with the depth of experience which would actually br beneficial to a company. The reason for that is not discrimination, it's that women overwhelmingly make different life choices than the men who fight their way to the top of these companies. It's perfectly clear ftom the internationsl data thst this is their vhoice. That is their right.
There are women who are accomplished and sit on boards , run companies etc., just a lot fewer.
What gets me is when women encounter the real level of competetive viciousness inside companies, they think they're being targeted because they're women. Wrong. They do the exact same thing to men, it's just that men eat it.
Women are smarter in a certain way. They see how bad it is and decide it's not worth it earlier than men do. They preserve more of their vital years for thing that matter than men do. This has to be counted as a form of intelligence.
Ihave a friend who works at a hospital. She watches high powered men die all the time. They almost all regret how they dpent their lives.
I would not want to have accomplished what Steve Jobs accomplished if it came with the price tag of being the person we now know Steve Jobs to have been.
You buy things with the hours of your life. Some peopel, men mostly, buy command psoitions in corporations and all that goes with that. That is their due. You can't just hand it out to people who didn't earn it.
as expected you misquoted me via ellipsis, cherry picked a recent news item to deflect from decades of substantive academically rigorous studies and then dismissed the most humanly relevant part of my post.
Feminists are just people with personality disorders they've politicized.
Gesetze sind wie Würste, man sollte besser nicht dabei sein, wenn sie gemacht werden
--Bismarck
If they were better qualified than the available men, then they would already be appointed to the boards without needing any legislation.
Riiiiiiiight!
Companies are not going to appoint less qualified people unless they're forced to ...
What are you talking about? They clearly do!
Nor is this just a male/female thing either, among others, it's famously a "what school did you go to" thing as well. Maybe for the crucial technical jobs qualification win, but companies are full of humans making decision on a very human basis: first and foremost they decide in favour of "people-like-us". You cannot seriously believe that the better qualified guy has never lost out on a job to the better connected guy. (It's not what you know ...)
Plus we are talking company boards here. How do you spell sinecure?
Better to be despised for too anxious apprehensions, than ruined by too confident a security. --Edmund Burke
No, because no woman has ever been attacked in a highly highly gendered fashion, called "bitches" when aggressive (though less than their "go-get-it" male counterparts), accused of sleeping around, or of being pre-menstrual, etc, etc, etc. You're livin in fucken dreamland matey.
I know - my wife was the highest paid person in her company - Higher indeed than the owner. It was a company involved in flooring and construction, so lots of "traditional men" worked there.
All those things happened.
She was called a bitch - by women.
She was accused all the time of sleeping with the boss - by women.
All of that stuff that people try to attribute to men. Man, there were some nasty sexist bigot women there.
One thing both she and I learned was that there is a interesting relationship between loud people and what they say, and what they do.
These women were very loud about how they were oppressed because of their sex, but if a woman did well, they made excuses for that success based soley on..... sex. Projection 101. They were sexist bigots, and the only positive thing they got out of their bigotry was a cheap easy excuse for their own lack of success.
Their projection was not unlike the Social Conservative gay hating folks who rail on about the unholy sinful acts of sodomy, but then are caught having sex with another of the same sex.
This is no accident, it is projection. Accuse others of what you are.
there are sexists of both sexes, obviously. I merely point out that if we use sexism to cure sexism, it will never work.
And since Animojo will chime in here, telling me I am doing the same - no, I'm not.
If I wrote something stupid like "All women are sexist", that would be a pretty good indicator that I was projecting, and probably am guilty of what I am accusing others of.
No, I just react, noting that a system that determines qualification for a position based on the equipment between a person's legs, is the very definition of sexist. These sexist women are trying to pass an overtly sex based law. To deny that is to be sexist.
The shepherds did so well protecting the flock that the sheep no longer believed that wolves existed.
they think they're being targeted because they're women. Wrong.
The Hampton-Alexander Review found evidence that this is true. Excuses given for not appointing women to exec level included:
- "I don't think women fit comfortably into the board environment"
- "My other board colleagues wouldn't want to appoint a woman on our board"
- "All the 'good' women have already been snapped up"
- "We have one woman already on the board, so we are done - it is someone else's turn"
Women are smarter in a certain way. They see how bad it is and decide it's not worth it earlier than men do. They preserve more of their vital years for thing that matter than men do. This has to be counted as a form of intelligence.
Ihave a friend who works at a hospital. She watches high powered men die all the time. They almost all regret how they dpent their lives.
So the logical thing is to support efforts to make those roles more attractive to women, because that would benefit everyone, men included. A change of culture would be good for all concerned.
const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
Rich men. Not white men.
There are plenty of white dudes who get fucked too. Plenty of systemic discrimination against subsets of âoewhiteâ that get lumped in.
You fell for it though. Donâ(TM)t feel bad, a lot of people do.
Rich vs poor, not white vs black, or women vs men. Itâ(TM)s just a distraction.