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Twitter Releases Diversity Report Under Pressure: Its Workforce – Mostly Male, White, Asian

twitter-racism Succumbing to growing public pressure, Twitter released the gender and ethnic breakdown of its workforce Wednesday, showing that it looks like most other major technology companies: overwhelming male, white and Asian.

In the U.S., nearly 90 percent of Twitter’s workers are white or Asian. And more than 90 percent of technology jobs in the U.S. are held by whites or Asians.

Men make up 70 percent of all staff, but 90 percent of technology staff, according to figures released by the company’s vice president for diversity and inclusion, Janet Van Huysse.

Twitter pledged to take steps to diversify its staff.

“We want to be more than a good business; we want to be a business that we are proud of,” Huysse said.

Diversity has become a hotly debated issue as some of Silicon Valley’s most powerful companies have begun revealing the makeup of their workforces.

These companies say they are intent on diversifying their ranks to stay in touch and in tune with their customers around the world.

Over the past two months, Yahoo, Google, Facebook and LinkedIn have reported that their staffs are between 62 percent and 70 percent male. Whites and Asians make up between 88 percent and 91 percent.

That has dismayed Blacks and Hispanics who say they are major consumers of technology yet make up just a tiny percentage of workers reaping the economic rewards in the nation’s top-paying industry.

Of Twitter’s U.S. employees, 3 percent are Hispanic and 2 percent Black. Yet Blacks, Hispanics and Asian Americans account for 41 percent of U.S. users, making Twitter more racially diverse than any other social network, including Facebook.

More than a quarter of Black Internet users in the U.S. are on Twitter, and “Black Twitter” — the congregation of Black users on the service — is considered one of the driving forces behind the company’s popularity and success.

“The numbers are pathetic, but this is a step in the right direction,” the Rev. Jesse Jackson said in an interview Wednesday.

Read the full story at usatoday.com

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