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Comment by forrestthewoods | Hacker News Reader

Not good based on what criteria exactly? They seem to say Google is doing poorly in comparison to other tech companies but they fail to provide a concrete comparison to support that point. They could be saying Google's diversity is "not good" as a sign of the greater cultural issues, but they single Google out too much for that.

Only 17% of Google's tech jobs go to women. Given that roughly 20% of comp sci degrees go to women that seems roughly reasonable [1]. For non-tech jobs the split is 52/48 which again seems roughly reasonable.

The numbers for non-Asian minorities are pretty grim. They appear to be much further off from national averages for relevant degrees. Would need much more detailed information before making an assessment.

[1] http://nces.ed.gov/programs/digest/d12/tables/dt12_349.asp [2] http://www.nsf.gov/statistics/seind12/c2/c2s3.htm

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As an Asian American minority, does it really matter? I don't see that many Asian Americans in hollywood, modeling for fashion companies, doing standup comedy, starring in televisions shows, playing in professional sports leagues, or playing in live bands compared to whites or other minorities. Should I feel enraged?

Of cause! Pretending to feel oppressed seems to be the thing of the moment. We need to staff every industry, company, college course based on a race/gender/etc quota!

Except for the ones that are already disproportionately filled with an approved racial or gender minority. We'll just quietly ignore those.

It matters because large numbers of people are denied opportunities based on discrimination. They can be denied by direct bias (e.g., 'we don't hire women because we think they are lousy engineers'; or 'women won't fit in our boys' club workplace') or indirect (e.g., discrimination causes more poverty for black families, and impoverished students perform poorly for a number of reasons; edit: or a student does not want to be the only woman/latino/black/etc. in every class for the next four years).

It is unjust for the people discriminated against and bad for our society: Our workforce loses valuable talent, and, from what I've read, diversity in the workplace is widely believed to improve performance (due to a wider number of perspectives and experiences).

Maybe it's not our fault, but it is our problem. We have to start earlier in the pipeline, that's all.

Exactly, if it's "not good", there's a space for a company with "good" record that can disrupt Google and drive it out of business.

Until that time arrives, it's neither "good" nor "bad", it's "best under the circumstances".

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