An Open Letter to Silicon Valley. Posting statements about how you stand…
By: Vantage Point
Tags: Programming, Inequality, BlackLivesMatter, Silicon Valley, Diversity In Tech

An Open Letter to Silicon Valley

Posting statements about how you stand with Black America is not enough

With Black Lives Matter protests continuing across the United States, it’s evident that our governments and institutions are failing to properly address the racial divide and provide systemic solutions to racial inequality.

Meanwhile, many tech companies have made statements of support for the Black community and the Black Lives Matter movement. However, in the case of racial inequality, these one-off statements of solidarity are not enough. It’s highly likely that after the media cycle of the protests expires, the widespread interest in fixing systemic racism will cease as well.

Racism is systemic and it requires a systems change approach. Much of the structural racial disparity in the U.S. is economic, with Black workers representing the majority of low paying jobs in agriculture, domestic, and service work. In addition, Black workers are far more likely to be unemployed under normal economic conditions, and especially during Covid-19. A Stanford University study found that only 1% of Black-owned businesses receive small business loans in their first year. That’s seven times lower than the percentage for white businesses. On the other end, big tech companies like Facebook, Apple, Google, and Microsoft represent a significant part of the workforce, but have incredibly low levels of diversity with minimal gains over the last few years:

Above: It has been six years since Apple, Facebook, Google, Microsoft released their diversity reports (2014) and pledged millions to increase diversity within their workforces but few gains have been made (WIRED).

In fact, TP Insights has found many big tech companies do not audit for diversity or publish diversity reports. How can Silicon Valley, which houses the majority of these companies, make claims of supporting Black communities when their workforce is made up of majority White and Asian males? Big tech companies must lead the charge in increasing diversity initiatives with measurable results and invest in Black-owned businesses to fight the structural racial disparity in the U.S. economy.

To systematically fix the underinvestment in Black businesses, Silicon Valley can do the following, as proposed by Will Walker of Tech Crunch:

Shift from proposals around “algorithmic bias” (preventing algorithms on sites like Facebook or Google from implicitly discriminating on the basis of race) and demand “algorithmic equality” where tech companies actively elevate Black businesses, Black investors, and Black voices instead of merely attempting to erase the bias entrenched in their systems.

Consumer tech companies, like Amazon, should actively promote Black-created products on recommended lists and Amazon Prime features.

Companies with SEO, like Google, can tweak language recognition software to better accommodate racial and regional differences among users to facilitate the learning and consumption of Black-created content.

In regards to food delivery companies like GrubHub and Seamless, a similar elevation of Black-owned restaurants would help counter the 40% of minority-owned businesses that have shut down due to the pandemic.

Big tech companies must move beyond statements of support for the Black Lives Matter movement and make transparent changes to their hiring practices and business objectives. This is the only way fo them to ensure they’re contributing to systemic change. By elevating Black businesses, tech companies can create a model for solidarity that will help to bridge the racial divide in the near future when #blacklivesmatter is no longer trending.