Programmed Inequality

This “sobering tale of the real consequences of gender bias” explores how Britain lost its early dominance in computing by systematically discriminating against its most qualified workers: women (Harvard Magazine)
 
In 1944, Britain led the world in electronic computing. By 1974, the British computer industry was all but extinct. What happened in the intervening thirty years holds lessons for all postindustrial superpowers. As Britain struggled to use technology to retain its global power, the nation’s inability to manage its technical labor force hobbled its transition into the information age. 
 
In Programmed Inequality, Mar Hicks explores the story of labor feminization and gendered technocracy that undercut British efforts to computerize. That failure sprang from the government’s systematic neglect… Keep Reading