Facebook logo (Photo : Reuters)
Facebook's workforce diveristy is being criticized by civil rights activists who argue that the social media giant has not done enough to boost its figures. The social networking company released a diversity report on Thursday, whose data showed small increases during the past year in the percent of non-white and women employees at the California company.
Facebook increased the worldwide percentage of female workers from 31 to 32 percent. That was during the period of June 2014 to May 2015.
The percentage of white employees fell from 57 to 55 percent, and the percent of Asian workers rose from 34 to 36 percent. Meanwhile, the figures for African-American and Latino employees were unchanged.
The biggest area of improvement in terms of diversity was Facebook's increase in non-tech female employees, according to TechCrunch. It rose from 47 to 52 percent.
However, this figure implies that fewer women are entering the tech sector. Popular theories point to factors such as fewer promotions, wage gaps, and sexual harassment.
The new Facebook diversity report paints the picture that white men still dominate most tech companies. That includes ones such as LinkedIn.
Rev. Jesse Jackson is president of the Rainbow Push Coalition, a social justice organization. He criticized the diversity figures of Facebook, Google, and eBay, which showed slight changes from 2014 and 2015.
Jackson believes they must do better. He argues that such tech corporations should not merely be "aspiring" to boost their diversity, but also set measurable goals and targets.
Butch Wing, a director of the advocacy group, noted that Intel is investing $300 million to hire and retain female and minority employees. He called it the "gold standard."
Facebook is also taking steps to increase diversity. It is testing a hiring strategy in which it considers one or more minorities for certain open positions, and supports women who are studying computer science and engineering.
Still, the company's total headcount surged by 40 percent this year. Meanwhile, its diversity numbers only showed an uptick.
The corporation admitted in a blog post that Facebook diversity figures need improvement, according to Mercury News. Experts believe the problem will take years to fix.
