Demand side here. I just want to calm everyone down.We posted our ad last week. We phrased it as "Women in particular are encouraged to apply". Read "We will only hire a woman". My advice to all men on this thread: you see an ad like this one, learn to read between the lines, and draw the consequences. Just so you are warned: we WILL fly out a few men, because we want to make it look like we do not discriminate. But we already decided that a woman is going to be hired.
I don't know if this poster is being honest, but I can say that "women are encouraged to apply" does not usually mean "we will only hire a woman". We always include it, and we have hired both men and women. If you are a man, do not be discouraged about a school that uses this type of language. It probably means just what it says or at worst "tie goes to a woman".
The number of schools requiring a diversity statement or a discussion of contribution to diversity and inclusion in the cover letter is way up relative to just a couple of years ago. The diversity plague is settling in rapidly.
Again, don't read anything into diversity statements. It is just for HR or admin. It doesn't usually signal anything else. Just suck it up and write a couple paragraphs saying nice things about diversity. The job market involves lots of hoops to jump through. This is a ridiculously minor one. If it really bothers you, any job that doesn't consist solely of trolling the internet is going to suck for you.
Here is the bottom line.
1. Some people have preferences to hire women. Some people have preferences to hire men. This preference varies in strength and openness.
2. I don't want to take a stance on which of these is greater. You read twitter you see one thing. You read this board you see another. I also don't want to take a moral stance on this in this message, I am trying to stick to practical advice.
3. I will say that gender preferences are not an overwhelmingly important factor in the job market on the whole. Lots of men do well. Lots of women do well. Lots of men do poorly. Lots of women do poorly. It's not impossible for men like some people on here imply or hugely unfairly rough on women like some people on twitter say.
4. Most importantly, you shouldn't let all this affect your strategy or get in your head if you are a candidate. Just go about your business. If you are slightly hurt because of your gender, there is nothing you can do about it.
5. If you are a male, never, ever, ever, mention any sort of anti-diversity stuff when you are on the market. I have seen it multiple times. Diversity statements that could have been pulled off of EJMR. Male candidates complaining during flyouts how they are being screwed out of jobs by women. This is an incredibly bad idea.
6. If you are a female, be a little cautious about how you play that card. If you come on too strong and say things that come across as "I know you are sexist because you are a male economist", that could really backfire on you.Do you really think women are not massively favored at the job market stage?
This doesn't mean they might not be discriminated against in other stages of the economics education, of course.
I suppose that depends on what you mean by "massively". But I was explicitly trying to avoid that particular debate. My main point was to give advice to male job market candidates to not let the most doomsday posts on this forum get in their head too much. And certainly not let it affect their strategy.
For example, if a male candidate didn't apply for a job because the listing said "women are encouraged to apply" or are asked for a diversity statement they would be making a huge mistake. In the past 5 years we have listed 6 positions and done both those things for each one. We hired 4 men and 2 women....See full post