Apple Card doesn't discriminate against women, investigation reveals
What do air conditioning, the Dalai Lama, HIV, chess, head injuries, climate change, beer, science, and meritocracy have in common? All of these were considered sexist in the crazy ride that was the last decade. Even the Apple Card was accused of being sexist in 2019, which led to a formal investigation of the issuer Goldman Sachs. Turns out, that was a big nothingburger.
A comprehensive inquest by the New York State Department of Financial Services (NYSDFS) has absolved Goldman Sachs of all sex discrimination allegations after it was called out for giving women applicants lower credit limits. The investigation involved statistical analysis of 400,000 New York applicants and scrutinized financial models and algorithms used by card issuer to grade applicants. It found no wrongdoing at any level.
Card issuer Goldman Sachs was falsely blamed for sexist practices after Silicon Valley feminists Steve Wozniak (Apple co-founder) and David Heinemeier Hansson (Ruby on Rails creator) found that their wives were assigned lower credit limits. Apple itself has little control over the financial nitty-gritty of Apple Card policies. The woke millionaires failed to realize that financial risk assessment is based on hard numbers.
NYSDFS managed to obtain specific justifications from Goldman Sachs for every single one of the 400,000 applicants scrutinized. In each instance, the card issuer cited exact parameters such as credit score, income, indebtedness, missed payments, and other credit history to prove that it had acted lawfully. Goldman Sachs's decisions were found in compliance with legal credit policies and exhibited no gender-based discrimination.
This isn't the first time feminists have discovered how mathematical models and algorithms tend to be "sexist". Gender-neutral assessment methods generally turn out to be detrimental to women. Back in 2017, the Australian public service had to cancel its blind recruitment model after it failed to achieve its intended goal of boosting female recruitment, but instead caused fewer women to get hired.
