I’ve been staring at the 2007 numbers that show where people bomb out of the hiring process for the City of Madison based on race, gender and disability. No data is perfect, and its always a challenge to know how to interpret it without being intimately familiar with the process so you know what the variable might be, but there does seem to be something wrong here.
OVERALL
Overall, out of 4727 applicants in 2007, here’s a few numbers that jumped out at me:
White males – 36.11% of the applicants, hired for 46.69% of the jobs.
Meanwhile, Hispanics showed increases, but females in general and Black and Asian males and females did not:
White
Females – 40.36% of the applicants, hired for 37.74% of the jobs.Black
Males – 5.64% of the applicants, hired for 1.94% of the jobs.
Females – 4.73% of the applicants, hired for 3.5% of the jobs.Asian
Males – 1.1% of the applicants, hired for .77% of the jobs.
Females – 1.37% of the applicants, hired for .78% of the jobs.Hispanic
Males – 1.73% of the applicants, hired for 1.94% of the jobs.
Females – 1.77% of the applicants, hired for 2.33% of the jobs.
WRITTEN TEST
The written test seemed to be an area where people did disproportionately well based on race and gender. It makes me wonder if there is something about the way the test are done that impact people in different ways.
White men – 36.11% of the applicants, 20.45% of the people screened out at the written test.
Other numbers that stood out were:
White
Females – 40.36% of the applicants, 56.79% of the people screened out at the written test.Black
Males – 5.64% of the applicants, 4.32% of the people screened out at the written test.
Females – 4.73% of the applicants, 6.6% of the people screened out at the written test.Asian
Males – 1.1% of the applicants, .38% of the people screened out at the written test.
Females – 1.37% of the applicants, 1.52% of the people screened out at the written test.Hispanic
Males – 1.73% of the applicants, 1.14% of the people screened out at the written test.
Females – 1.77% of the applicants, 1.77% of the people screened out at the written test.
CERTIFIED
There were 2507 applicants that were considered for certification of the 4727 applicants. Of those, only 923 were certified.
White males – 36.11% of the applicants, 50.48% of the people certified.
Here’s how the rest did:
White
Females – 40.36% of the applicants, 33.26% of the people certified.Black
Males – 5.64% of the applicants, 3.14% of the people certified.
Females – 4.73% of the applicants, 2.16% of the people certified.Asian
Males – 1.1% of the applicants, .32% of the people certified.
Females – 1.37% of the applicants, 1.19% of the people certified.Hispanic
Males – 1.73% of the applicants, 1.62% of the people certified.
Females – 1.77% of the applicants, 1.51% of the people certified.
I’m not sure what is going on. Could it be our education system, our values as a society, biases by individuals or “the system” or problems with our methodologies? Or are white men just better employees?
p.s. The numbers for people with disabilities has a glitch, so I didn’t report those numbers here.
