It’s not punching down for the Indian-born CEO of Google (who was paid $200 million last year) to fire a twentysomething coder, it’s punching up because the victim’s a white male, just as it wasn’t punching down for Apple CEO Tim Cook to attack an Indiana pizza maker because Tim is gay. (In today’s zeitgeist, the billionaire always wins.)
Granted, all of this sounds ridiculous, which it is. If Google’s CEO actually believed that his firm was leaving money on the table by not employing enough women (or black or Hispanic) engineers due to sexism, it would be his fiduciary duty to hire far more.
But of course he has zero intention of doing much of that.
Why can’t Google, with all its money, find as many women as men?
For one reason, because coding doesn’t much appeal to women. My wife, for instance, used to be a computer programmer. She was good at it, but it’s a boring job if you find people more interesting than things. Further, American programmers used to be rather well paid, but then the H-1B visa program allowed employers to substitute cheaper Asian men for American women. (…)
Let me close with one question about Google’s personnel policy: Compared with how you felt last week, how do you feel today about someday entrusting your life to a Google self-driving car?
