Does “choose not to identify” hurt your chances when applying online?

> Most of the times, you're given the option to opt-out of providing that information - and I feel like I would like to opt out of regurgitating my stats but I'm curious about what impact that might have on my attractiveness as a candidate.

The employer should (many will explicitly note that they do they do this, both to make people more comfortable answering and to mitigate lawsuit risk) separate the information from your application so that no one involved in the selection process will ever have access to it. While this is gathered for statistical purposes, its almost entirely stuff that would be bright-line violations of anti-discrimination law to use in the selection process.

Speaking from my own big tech hiring experience, as the hiring manager, and working with our recruiters from HR, if you do not belong to one of the "in demand" demographics, then it generally does not make a difference between providing the true value and declining to provide that information, because the positive identification of underrepresented groups was the part that made a difference.

I never got to see the responses myself, but the recruiters from HR could. That said, if a hiring manager wants to bias their hiring based on this information, they'll figure out at some point before making a decision, whether or not you provided it. Your resume, your name, your educational background, your accent, etc. all passively shed information, so I would often find the answers without wanting to or trying to find them.

I answer the question using another question -- do I want to work at an organization who cares about that kind of stuff?

Are my "disabilities" being ranked against my abilities?

I get that everything can be a checkbox and "right fit", but if someone looks over me for not checking a diversity checkbox, I am happy to be not hired by them. Job applications and interviews are a 2 way street.

Yes of course. If the goal is to hire for attribute x and you decline to say whether you posses that, they will pass you over until they find what they're looking for.

The question here isn't about what "should" happen or what is legal. It's a question I share -- for which types of companies will this hurt my chances of landing a job?

Surely there are some out there who abuse these responses. I'd personally prefer to put "decline to answer" for all race/veteran/disability questions. But I don't because I'm worried someone will notice that and think I'm a weirdo for doing it.

> Does “choose not to identify” hurt your chances when applying online?

The real answer is probably "it depends".

I'm sure many recruiters/HR try and be as unbiased as humans can be and don't take demographic info into account for hiring.

I'm sure there are racist people out there that really don't prefer to hire a black person, for example.

And at the same time, I'm sure there are "woke" recruiters and HR that really don't prefer to hire a white man if there's a woman or POC available.

I'm sure there are some people in companies out there that practice ethnic nepotism and do everything they can to promote hiring their countrymen over others.

You could probably test this to some extent by applying to jobs with identical resumes with different male/female names that sound white, asian, black, latino, indian, etc and see what the response rates among different types of companies are.

What I think is crazy is that this information is part of the hiring process at all: particularly questions asking you who you prefer fucking. That asking who you prefer fucking is close to the standard in corporate America is crazy to me.

Like an EEO questionnaire? It probably doesn't matter. No one who is making a hiring decision is supposed to see that information, and it only gets used for reporting purposes (so they can prove they aren't discriminating against anyone).

I'd be very surprised if any legitimate recruitment tool exposed that information to anyone evaluating you.

If the company is trying to add diversity to a team they might be looking to fill more spots of x gender, race or disability. If you don't fit that gap then it probably doesn't matter if answer or not. Not that they will pass you up if you don't fill that criteria. Imagine if your company is getting bad press because you have a 90% male work force. There will be pressure to hire any good non male candidates.

It does not hurt if you are white/asian. It's treated essentially the same as them. It might hurt you otherwise though

One could argue one should mark it as it shows of all applicants a certain % are of X attribute, so hiring applicant of X isn't unusual as maybe they made up a large or even super majority of applicants.

I always say I'm gender neutral / gay and since I'm tan always check that I'm hispanic.