What I got out of it was "Women don't apply for high paying jobs, and the only way we can get women in those jobs is if people like me go out and get the women applicants."
This can be true, though. If the announcement of a high paying job is written in a way that isn't designed to be inclusive, it can result in less women applying than men. If a job seeks out a person with a degree in a male-dominated field and doesn't leave the door open for people to apply who have comparable experience, it can result in less women applying than men. If a lot of the canvassing for a job is done through one's social network, which is male dominated, that can result in more male applicants than female. Equality doesn't come from wishing it so, it doesn't come from mandating it, it comes from people actually confronting the root causes of the problem and changing the things they're doing wrong.
And I don't believe you can legislatively fix problems like this without breaking bigger things. The apparatus for dealing with diversity in the American workplace is immense and expensive and it's completely broken. My father, who represents his company against such complaints as part of his job, told me about a conference with the head of New York's human rights commission where they spoke about the problem of declining complaints as if it were a problem of declining sales. She was brainstorming ways for them to drum up more business, because it's their livelihood, not a cause. And Obama's answer to the question was to acknowledge there was a problem and say "Don't worry, we passed another law!" To me he's the one who came off sounding like he had no comprehension of how the world works.
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This can be true, though. If the announcement of a high paying job is written in a way that isn't designed to be inclusive, it can result in less women applying than men. If a job seeks out a person with a degree in a male-dominated field and doesn't leave the door open for people to apply who have comparable experience, it can result in less women applying than men. If a lot of the canvassing for a job is done through one's social network, which is male dominated, that can result in more male applicants than female. Equality doesn't come from wishing it so, it doesn't come from mandating it, it comes from people actually confronting the root causes of the problem and changing the things they're doing wrong.
And I don't believe you can legislatively fix problems like this without breaking bigger things. The apparatus for dealing with diversity in the American workplace is immense and expensive and it's completely broken. My father, who represents his company against such complaints as part of his job, told me about a conference with the head of New York's human rights commission where they spoke about the problem of declining complaints as if it were a problem of declining sales. She was brainstorming ways for them to drum up more business, because it's their livelihood, not a cause. And Obama's answer to the question was to acknowledge there was a problem and say "Don't worry, we passed another law!" To me he's the one who came off sounding like he had no comprehension of how the world works.