I’d assume that demographics should somewhat match real demographics. If your country is 50% white people and 50% black people, you’d see that in hiring in general with some variance.
You’d probably have to adjust for socioeconomic level etc. It’s no good if all the hires in the low paying jobs are one type of people.
I don’t think it’s impossible to tell even if “99%” is hyperbole.
> I’d assume that demographics should somewhat match real demographics.
At work? I doubt that. Only for a job available to anyone and chosen by everyone. I don't think there's any jobs even roughly like that.
People get jobs and then their social and professional network now has someone who works at $BIGCO. Now folks can see themselves there and apply for openings, which could accelerate this effect. Now you can see minorities hired on merit, showing up in clusters.
> I don’t think it’s impossible to tell even if “99%” is hyperbole.
I dunno - it just seems like "majority ethnicity implies merit, minority implies DEI" to me.
People remember famous scientists like Einstein, Feynman, or even Bill Nye the Science Guy, and believe it's obvious that white men are more qualified in STEM, and anyone denying it is in denial. They ignore that before the Equal Employment Opportunity Act of 1972, discrimination was legal in the US, and that Ivy League universities only started admitting women from 1969 to 1981 (depending on the university).
People who say they can tell the percentage of DEI hires on sight—up to two significant digits from a data set, like "99%"—imagine that the past was a meritocracy, because they never grew past these simple stories to encourage children to pursue science.
Is it an accident that your example consists of three Jewish people and would you argue that they did receive less discrimination compared to other demographics regarding access to education?
The Nazis, who were white supremacists, persecuted Einstein and dismissed his theory of relativity as "Jewish science". Einstein fled to the US, which was a much less racist environment compared to Nazi Germany, and Einstein's theory helped the US create the atomic bomb that defeated the Nazis.
The US had a "Jewish quota" to limit the number of Jews allowed in universities, so "white" Jews experienced more discrimination than white Christians. However, racial segregation between white and black people was legal until 1954-1964, so white Jews generally experienced less discrimination compared to black people.
If Germany and the US wasn't so racist, science would have advanced further than it is today. Famous Jewish scientists (and science communicators) proved that white supremacy was wrong, not right.
> white Jews generally experienced less discrimination compared to black people.
Perhaps. And yet your initial statement would assume that you would want to discriminate against them.
This is more or less exactly what I believe DEI policies would lead to. There are enough people that believe Jews are advantaged but the opposite is mostly true. Still under the metrics DEI generally proposes they would need to be discriminated against.
This is why having the premise to treat everyone equally is the better solution than what DEI proposes. And criticism of DEI is not white supremacy.
Einstein moved to the US well after he became a famous scientist. The University of Zurich, where he got his degree, has been open to women since the mid 19th century.
The Ivy League first started admitting women in 1870 (Cornell). The rest, however, were far later.
Being a DEI hire does not make the hire discriminatory. I think you don’t understand the issue.
I gather you assume any person of color or female hire is a “DEI” hire and by that you mean someone who isn’t qualified. This assumption is quite stupid.
