ยง Simpson's Paradox
- The example which made simpson's paradox click for me was the extreme case.
- Suppose department
E
hires every woman but only half the men ( E
for every), while department N
hires neither men nor women. - So in each department, women are either advantaged (as in
E
) or are on-par (as in N
). - Suppose we have
100
men and 100
women. - Let
90
men apply for E
and 10
men apply for N
. In total, 45
men are accepted (90/2 + 0)
. - Let
10
women apply for E
and 90
women apply for N
. In total, 10+0
women are accepted. - Thus, it appears as if only
10
women are selected to 45
men, implying some kind of bias. - In reality, all departments are pro women hiring. The majority of women apply to the deparment
N
which is hard to get into , thereby making it appear as if the institute ( E
and N
combined) are against women hires. - The information that is lost is that of the split up of men and women who apply to
E
and N
.