Apple improves pay equity, increases hiring of minorities in 2016 Diversity report

In its latest Diversity report released today, Apple highlighted an increase in the hiring of women and underrepresented minorities and also said it’s working to improve pay equity among employees.

The numbers include women making up 37% percent of new hires (versus 32% of current employees) and U.S. underrepresented minorities accounting for 27% (versus 22% of current employees). Apple includes “Black, Hispanic, Native American, Native Hawaiian, and Other Pacific Islander” in the underrepresented group and counts new hires within the last 12 months as of June.

Apple’s new report shows how the numbers have steadily increased since 2014 when the company first started releasing its diversity data:

In addition, Apple said it improved pay equity for its U.S. employees this year and is in the process of doing the same for “salaries, bonuses, and annual stock grants” of employees worldwide.

Equal work deserves equal pay. This past year, we looked at the total compensation for U.S. employees and closed the gaps we found. We’re now analyzing the salaries, bonuses, and annual stock grants of all our employees worldwide. If a gap exists, we’ll address it. And we’ll continue our work to make sure we maintain pay equity…

We’ve achieved pay equity in the United States for similar roles and performance. Women earn one dollar for every dollar male employees earn. And underrepresented minorities earn one dollar for every dollar white employees earn.

The Washington Post reports that Apple hosted a number of historically black colleges on its campus this week, many of which it’s associated with through minority scholarship and intern programs the company has:

…the company hosted a delegation of faculty from more than a dozen historically black colleges, while a class of senior engineering and science majors from historically black colleges who had interned at Apple presented technology projects they had built. Apple has hired eight of those 33 interns. The group was affiliated with a scholarship program for students from historically black colleges that Apple launched last year.

On Apple’s updated Diversity page where it publishes the annual data, the company is currently featuring profiles of employees from various parts of the company. You can read more from Apple’s 2016 Diversity report on its website.