Post 2: Diversity and Immigration Issues in Tech

H-1B Visas

To summarize, the H-1B visa is a non-immigrant dual intent work visa for high-skill workers in specialty occupations, often requiring a bachelor’s degree. H-1B visas allow work for 3-6 years. Sponsorship must come from employers – in the Labor Condition Application (LCA), employers must pay a wage similar to equivalent workers or prevailing wages in the geographic region as well as provide working conditions that will not adversely affect other similarly employed workers. There are 65,000 visas offered each year, and the first 20,000 petitions filed for beneficiaries with a US master’s degree or higher are exempt from the limit.

Support for the H-1B Visa System

Fill open positions in talent shortages: as highly educated individuals, H-1B beneficiaries can fill gaps that otherwise could not be filled. Companies often claim that there is a talent shortage that these visa holders fulfill.
Increased output: high-skilled beneficiaries help increase innovation and productivity. As output increases, companies strengthen, which can create more jobs or job security.
Dual intent: though the H-1B program is not for immigration, H-1B beneficiaries are able to simultaneously work and apply for green cards under the program. Following a period of living in the United States as a permanent resident while holding a green card, application for naturalized citizenship can occur.
Increased diversity: H-1B beneficiaries bring diversity to their sponsor company, which is invaluable for innovation and can also increase their competitiveness in the global market.
American competitiveness: without the program, candidates may seek opportunities in other countries. The United States thus must provide an opportunity for workers to work in the United States and strengthen American business.

Support against the H-1B Visa System

The replacement of American professionals: companies can replace American workers with cheaper labor, especially if hired through outsourcing and consulting companies. Wages will be driven down and H-1B professionals will be hired over equally or more qualified American workers to satisfy the bottom line.
Unnecessary demand: some studies claim that there is no shortage of American talent for companies to hire. Rather, they seek H-1B beneficiaries to drive down wage costs.
The exploitation of H-1B beneficiaries: H-1B beneficiaries are often provided worse pay and conditions than their American peers. The system in place provides lower salaries to H-1B beneficiaries because they often work for outsourcing and consulting companies that can drive down the cost of a technical experts. Because beneficiaries require companies to sponsor their visa, it is difficult for them to complain or change jobs in the risk that their visa is revoked or expires.
Lottery system: H-1B visas are distributed by a lottery system. This means that visas are not always distributed to the best possible beneficiaries.

Insights from Epicurean Ethics on Issue

The Epicurean ethical framework would probably support the use of the H-1B visa to hire highly-skilled workers in the tech industry in order to promote growth because both parties receive pleasure in that needs are being met: the beneficiary of the visa is receiving pay that is around equal to what an American with the same position would receive which is necessary to lead a pleasurable life, i.e. meet basic desires or needs for living. Furthermore, the tech company is having its needs meet and experiences more pleasure because there are jobs in the tech industry that are highly skilled that can only be met by hiring from abroad in order to compete in the industry and receive pleasure from being able to take care of natural and necessary pleasures like affording food, drink, and shelter through being paid. However, the Epicurean framework would not support the possibility of exploitation of H-1B visa holders (those that are hired by outsourcing/consulting companies) because it infringes on their right to maximize pain and increase pleasure as well as the overall idea that people should not pursue pleasure at the expense of others’ pain. The consequence of this that American workers are also less likely to be hired is also something that Epicureans would not agree with because it increases others’ pain. Thus, the Epicurean framework would support changes being made to fix the loophole in order to increase pleasure and promote friendly relationships. However, Epicurus also believed that the best thing to reduce anxiety i.e. pain is to get rid of desires (i.e. hiring foreign highly-skilled workers) rather than to fulfill desires so possibly Epicureans would also support somehow training more Americans in these highly-skilled roles. Another solution, although very far-fetched, is to get rid of the tech industry altogether because it is unnecessary to humans’ survival and only causes pain due to more desires needing to be fulfilled and frustration and anxiety from competition.

Google Internal Memo

The main focus of the memo, written by James Damore, is to contend that Google is an “ideological echo chamber”, where ideas that differ from the norm are unwelcome. Damore’s main focus is the gender gap in tech, and he discusses what he believes are the contributing factors to this gap, with most relating to biology. He believes women “have a stronger interest in people rather than things”, generally referred to as empathizing (women) vs. systemizing (men). Additionally, he believes women are biologically less inclined to be assertive, which he says is why women are underrepresented in leadership roles at tech companies. He also says that women are more easily stressed, and consequently are less able to handle high stress jobs than men. The author then goes into “non-discriminatory” ways for reducing the gender gap, such as opening more part-time roles. He also expands on what he believes are the harms of Google’s current biases, namely that the bar for employment at Google is being lowered as a consequence of this push for diversity. Finally, he goes into his suggestions, which include stopping the alienation of conservatives, confronting Google’s biases, and stopping programs restricted by race or gender. The main aspect of this memo that Epicurean ethics would approve of is the confronting of biases. Biases cause us to have a preference for one thing over another thing without fair justification. Consequently, bias negatively impacts how we treat others. Because of this, when bias becomes involved in how we treat someone, it infringes upon that person’s pleasure. In Epicureanism, it is very important that your pleasures do not encroach on those of others; therefore, the idea of confronting bias, so that it can be eliminated, is certainly an ethical action in Epicureanism. One aspect of this memo that Epicureanism would consider unethical is its harmful perpetuation of baseless stereotypes about the differences between men and women. Much of the memo is predicated on the idea that biology makes men more effective (on average) than women at software engineering and leadership. However, much of the science Damore relies on has been condemned as inaccurate. One study Damore cites multiple times studied day old babies, and found that given the option of looking at a face or a mobile, boys looked at the mobile longer and girls looked at the face longer. From this, the study’s author, Simon Baron-Cohen, concluded men’s brains are suited for learning systems, being aggressive, and gaining power. Female brains, Baron-Cohen determined, are more suited for empathizing and tasks that focus on other people. However, this study, which much of Damore’s argument relies on, has been widely derided for lacking crucial controls. More importantly, no one has been able to replicate it, meaning it’s essentially worthless. Further, Damore asserts that women are more easily stressed and thus less equipped for handling high-stress leadership positions, but studies have shown that this anxiety is related to the unique pressures and discrimination women in high positions face in fields dominated by men, rather than the biology Damore attributes it to. By proclaiming faux science as truth, Damore is preserving stereotypes that will make it harder for women to be taken seriously as software engineers and as leaders, which is a serious infringement upon their potential pleasure. Consequently, this aspect of the memo is unethical under Epicureanism.

Gender Bias

Within the tech sector there is undoubtedly a large difference between the percentages of traditionally male and female gendered individuals. There is, on the whole, about four times the number of men in technology versus women. In general, companies and big-names in technology recognize this as an issue that should be addressed. This is the main problem. However, this main problem is enhanced by the fact that women do not feel as though they are welcomed or respected in the workplace in the same way that their male coworkers are respected. One such example is the interviewee who mentions that, when a male interviewer enters the room, “finally someone who knows what’s going on.” Additionally, there is a bias that women are not as capable as men when faced with computer science, or even more analytically related problems. This has many causes even more problems. In some people’s minds, this causes women not be hired due to this bias. And, when they are hired, there are some who feel that women were selected for the fact that they are women. It also brings forward the question of whether younger women are dissuaded from entering the tech sector because they are told that they cannot hack it. All of these issues create tensions between women trying to enter the tech sector, those attempting to remedy the problem, and those who do not see a problem with the current climate. There are a number of solutions at work, including hiring goals, programs to specifically encourage women, and classes to make the workplace less hostile for women. Epicurean ethics would not deal with the ideal number of percentages of each gender in technology, but rather the sub-problems that are contributing to the bigger issue. Dealing first with the issue of respect and hostility within the workplace, Epicurean ethics would take the stance that the hostile individuals would be increasing the anxiety of women within the workplace. This would infringe on the natural desires of the individuals having the anxiety for the benefit of the fulfillment of the unnecessary desire of power for the disrespectful. That aspect is clear: no one should be driven out because they feel alienated. The response to the question of capability goes hand-in-hand with the previous point. Since, as noted in the reading, a gender does not define a capability, whoever is capable of doing the job should be allowed the natural desire of mental fulfillment and challenge. On the final topic of hiring and the solutions in place, everyone should be allowed the chance to find their happiness. Epicurus might take issue with the idea of hiring goals if only because it means propping up another person at the expense of another. If Epicurean Ethics reigned, everyone would be able to get the job they believed would bring them the most natural benefits. That said, there would be support for any measure to make those who currently feel left on the fringes to feel more incorporated into the system. Overall, The Epicurean ethical framework would take the stance that gender diversity is a problem in the sense that the hostility of the workplace prevents people from developing good working relationships in which both parties are able to fulfill themselves and achieve happiness.

Race and Ethnicity Biases

The technology industry has very large issues related to the integration of different ethnicities and races. There is no better example of this problem than in Silicon Valley, where the culture is said to be “too white”. Large tech companies such as Google and Facebook have attempted to tackle this issue but have seen little success. This can be seen in the diversity statistics, where African Americans form 13 percent of the population yet make no more than 1 percent of employees at the big firms. Not having a diverse community can in itself make the issue even larger since the area can seem unwelcoming and deter prospects that had the intention of working in Silicon Valley. One of the main issues that contributes to the problem is that the main technology companies do not recruit from predominantly black universities, which is where more than 20 percent of black computer scientists graduate from. These companies look towards top universities such as Stanford and MIT to recruit interns and permanent positions, however these universities themselves have diversity issues and therefore the problem only grows bigger. On top of this, permanently black colleges, for the most part, are unable to compete with the top universities since their computer science courses are not as rigorous. This imposes a serious issue when it comes to recruiting since the companies look to invest in employees that can contribute the most to the company, and in their eyes this may be the students that are better prepared in coding, however we must remember that employees from a diverse background bring much more than coding to the table. From an epicurean perspective, companies would recruit people from all background since going against this would cause discomfort for a set of people. An important aim of this ethical perspective is to find a state of tranquility, and thus hiring people from all backgrounds would bring tranquility to the greatest amount of people. Companies would take the path that would fulfill the most amount of pleasure, and this cannot be possible by hiring predominantly white employees. Pleasure is obtained by knowledge amongst other things, and this knowledge is better obtained by hiring people of all cultures who can contribute their own perspectives and ideas to the company. It is not necessarily for the sake of equality that the companies would seek different recruits, but because this would bring the most pleasure and tranquility. Fortunately, companies have started to take action to tackle the diversity problem and have even set up permanent positions focused on this issue. As the needle starts moving, tech companies are starting to cast a wider net to attract members of all backgrounds who can have a very large impact on the growth of the industry. This will bring the most pleasure to the largest group of people including the minorities that form such an important part of our community.