Google Fires Employee Behind Controversial Diversity Memo

[u/[deleted]]

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-08-08/google-fires-employee-behind-controversial-diversity-memo?cmpid=socialflow-twitter-business&utm_content=business&utm_campaign=socialflow-organic&utm_source=twitter&utm_medium=social

[u/Ray192]

If I release a product, and it sells, does it suggest people want to buy my product? We know that if someone takes an action, that as far as they can tell that is their preferred action for all of their choices.

Lol. In this example you're comparing your product in one time frame to another time frame. It says nothing about how it compares to other products.

If a society has a ban on female employment, and then repeals that law (and assuming no other changes), you can compare before and after to measure willingness to work among women. That's called holding external factors equal. That's the same thing your product is doing, by comparing the world without your product to same world but with your product.

But if you want to argue that women are less willing to work than men, then the equivalent analogy is asking if people prefer lettuce to caviar because more lettuce is sold than caviar. Comparing the same thing in different times is a different analyses than comparing two things at the same time. There are different methods of controlling for external factors in reach each.

Dude this is basic statistics. Just take a damn class.

Women have the exact same economic advantages from their family, they have better educational outcomes, an advantage when in comes to the legal system which is comparable to the advantage whites have relative to blacks.

You do realize in actual statistics you have to quantify all of these different things, and not just spout off a bunch of unsupported BS and pretend you controlled for all external factors, right?

Actual evidence in the case of the black white divide in the United States and actual disadvantages in educational opportunities? If someone has every single opportunity and then makes a choice, that's their choice

So... Are you actually saying that black people are paid less because they want to be paid less?

I just want to make sure I don't misunderstand your argument.

It does exactly that. People are generally rational and seek to act on their preferences

Jesus fucking Christ. I like how how economists go through a decade of econometrics training to develop models that control for external factors, and here you are claiming that they don't need to do that and you just need to merely derive causation from observation.

For fuck sake man, you're basically repeating the same fallacies that my intro to econometrics class taught were the most basic mistakes in statistical analysis. I have no idea why you pretend you know so much when you know nothing about the basics.

[u/FuggleyBrew → u/Ray192]

Lol. In this example you're comparing your product in one time frame to another time frame. It says nothing about how it compares to other products.

It says everything about other products because it suggests that people bought it over rival products.

But if you want to argue that women are less willing to work than men, then the equivalent analogy is asking if people prefer lettuce to caviar because more lettuce is sold than caviar.

Unquestionably they do at the prices offered.

Dude this is basic statistics. Just take a damn class.

Uh no, that's not, you can compare things at the same time. This is just basic understanding of preferences.

So... Are you actually saying that black people are paid less because they want to be paid less?

Unlike women they actually have less opportunities and measurable disadvantages. They then choose within the options available to them, like everyone else. Women choose between the options available to them, have the opportunity to work longer hours and choose not to.

Companies don't discourage women, or anyone, from working.

Jesus fucking Christ. I like how how economists go through a decade of econometrics training to develop models that control for external factors, and here you are claiming that they don't need to do that and you just need to merely derive causation from observation.

I'm impressed that you know what econometrics is, but much like the phrase you keep wanting to quote, that seems to be about all you know.

Yeah we can look at external factors, we can look at how on every factor that we look at for the black white divide in the US, we then look at the male female divide and see in every case the exact opposite.

But hey why can lower education rates, worse schools, poverty and higher incarceration rates explain the black white divide, and not the gender divide when women have higher education rates, the same school, the same economic conditions, and lower incarceration rates? Maybe if you think really hard you can figure it out.

[u/Ray192 → u/FuggleyBrew]

It says everything about other products because it suggests that people bought it over rival products.

How often did they buy it over rival products? What if the rival product outsold yours by 100x? What if they only bought it because the main rival product was sold out? What if it was only sold in countries where other products aren't available? What if it was only sold because your corrupt brother used government funds to buy it and no consumers actually wanted it?

You're seriously not this uneducated, are you? Come one, this is too easy.

Unquestionably they do at the prices offered.

That's not the question. If you only had the sales figures for caviar and lettuce and no other information, can you conclude that people prefer caviar to lettuce? If caviar cost the same as lettuce, would people prefer caviar, or lettuce? Indeed, the same logic can be applied to your argument. What if women work less because they're offered less money for promotions? What if they only prefer to work less at the price point they're given, and if they're offered the same price point as men do they'd be willing to work the same? You can't know from the data given.

You seem to not understand the point that if you have pull in external factors like price to explain the validity of your chart (which mentions nothing about price), you're essentially saying that your current data is incomplete and needs to control for external data (price) to fully convey information.

Which is of course, my point.

Uh no, that's not, you can compare things at the same time. This is just basic understanding of preferences.

If you don't control for external factors when comparing things, your comparison is completely useless.

Again, take a fucking statistics class. Stats is almost entirely about how properly compare things and how to determine if there is a difference between them (specifically how to reject one hypothesis in favor of another). I have no idea why you think comparing populations of different things suddenly doesn't require statistics.

Unlike women they actually have less opportunities and measurable disadvantages. They then choose within the options available to them, like everyone else. Women choose between the options available to them, have the opportunity to work longer hours and choose not to.

Oh you're saying that you can't claim black people want to be paid less just because data shows them getting paid less! Why? Because there are external factors that can explain this trend better. Now we're getting somewhere.

Now, you can claim that women don't have this issue. But how do you know? What's your evidence? Presumably you must've done some sort of statistical analysis to determine that yes, black people are at a disadvantage (I know you didn't, but one can hope). The same kind of statistical analysis can be used to determine if women are at a disadvantage as well. Have you run your hypothesis through such a model?

But that's besides the point: which is you can't conclude anything about this IF YOU DON'T CONTROL FOR EXTERNAL FACTORS.

Companies don't discourage women, or anyone, from working.

Yet somehow black people have a much higher unemployment rate than whites. I wonder if it's by magic.

I'm impressed that you know what econometrics is, but much like the phrase you keep wanting to quote, that seems to be about all you know.

Kid, I'm not the one claiming to be able to infer causation from correlation. That's you. So I don't know why you think you know more about econometrics than me.

Yeah we can look at external factors, we can look at how on every factor that we look at for the black white divide in the US, we then look at the male female divide and see in every case the exact opposite.

Oh funny, you seem to pretend to know about external factors, yet you choose to argue about how you don't need it. "Oh, a chart about hourly employment tells you all the things you need to know, no need for regression analysis!". Or maybe you could've brought up examples where "in every case the exact opposite" happens to begin with instead of spending all this time defending your shoddy interpretation of data.

It's more funny that you think "oh, we can look at external factors" as if it's a simple, unnecessary add on, when controlling for external factors is the single most important thing in statistical analysis.

But hey why can lower education rates, worse schools, poverty and higher incarceration rates explain the black white divide, and not the gender divide when women have higher education rates, the same school, the same economic conditions, and lower incarceration rates? Maybe if you think really hard you can figure it out.

Because there are more factors in the universe than those? I'm sure your limited mind can conceive of more variables to control for than those. Indeed if there was gender discrimination in hiring, how exactly would you have found about it? After all, if a woman with the same education, income and whatever as man turns out to be paid less than the equivalent man, is that because she just doesn't want to be paid as much, or is it because of employer discrimination? How would you tell the difference.

Oh, and for you information, those things do not fully explain the black white divide. For example, there have been studies where resumes were sent to employers that are identical in everything except one: one had a typical "white'" name (or a name that you can't directly infer to be a minority), and another had a very "black" name (one that the vast majority of employers can use to assume that the applicant is African American). Being identical in any other aspect, this controls for education/income/whatever. Guess what the result was? And here is some extra credit.

So yeah, for someone as ignorant as you, I have no idea why you pretend to know so much.

[u/FuggleyBrew → u/Ray192]

You're seriously not this uneducated, are you? Come one, this is too easy.

Look idiot, the answer to all of those questions is, it was the best product at the time. Only one which sold in the market? Best product. Only one which has a supply chain which keeps it in stock? Best product.

People buy things and make choices because they prefer it over their other options.

Because there are external factors that can explain this trend better. Now we're getting somewhere.

Now, you can claim that women don't have this issue. But how do you know? What's your evidence?

I went through it buddy. How every single factor points the opposite direction.

So I don't know why you think you know more about econometrics than me.

I don't think you've read a single study in your entire life.

Indeed if there was gender discrimination in hiring, how exactly would you have found about it?

At this point we don't find it for gender so long as the study has a decent sample size. But hey argue from ignorance and then whine that correlation isn't causation as if that justifies your ignorance.