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Google illegally underpaid thousands of workers

theguardian.com

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Re: Google illegally underpaid thousands of workers

#31

Post by RIMR »

threatofrain wrote: post #3

> Google executives have been aware since at least May 2019 that the company was failing to comply with local laws in the UK, Europe and Asia that mandate temporary workers be paid equal rates to full-time employees performing similar work, internal Google documents and emails reviewed by the Guardian show. > But rather than immediately correct the errors, the company dragged its feet for more than two years, the doc…

Honestly, underpaying employees should be viewed no differently than any other for of theft, and executives willfully allowing it to happen ought to be facing time behind bars for it.

Re: Google illegally underpaid thousands of workers

#32

Post by RIMR »

ashtonkem wrote: post #27
threatofrain wrote: post #3

> Google executives have been aware since at least May 2019 that the company was failing to comply with local laws in the UK, Europe and Asia that mandate temporary workers be paid equal rates to full-time employees performing similar work, internal Google documents and emails reviewed by the Guardian show. > But rather than immediately correct the errors, the company dragged its feet for more than two years, the doc…

As I keep saying: there’s nothing more dangerous than a company (or department in this case) that was once wildly profitable and is now merely profitable. It’s absurd that even at places like Google, which has effectively infinite money, there’s still this present attitude of not being able to afford paying workers. Nuts.

It's not that they don't think they can afford to pay fairly. It's that the decision makers are incentivized to cut every possible cost and are rewarded for it with multimillion dollar bonuses.

Re: Google illegally underpaid thousands of workers

#33

Post by ashtonkem »

RIMR wrote: post #32
ashtonkem wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As I keep saying: there’s nothing more dangerous than a company (or department in this case) that was once wildly profitable and is now merely profitable. It’s absurd that even at places like Google, which has effectively infinite money, there’s still this present attitude of not being able to afford paying workers. Nuts.

It's not that they don't think they can afford to pay fairly. It's that the decision makers are incentivized to cut every possible cost and are rewarded for it with multimillion dollar bonuses.

Yes, you’re right. I worded my post for the sake of glibness and not clarity.

I think what’s particularly fascinating is not the relentless drive for more profits, that’s been hashed to death and I have nothing original to offer here, but how the internal narrative of “we can’t afford to pay them” holds in cases where it’s transparent bullshit. Of course Google can afford to pay its temp workers a fair wage, and of course they don’t want to. It’s just surprising that the story they tell themselves is so trivially falsifiable.

Re: Google illegally underpaid thousands of workers

#34

Post by wizzwizz4 »

aemreunal wrote: post #30
Ansil849 wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> any chance this ends up with serious repercussions like prison time When has any staff member of a FAANG company faced prison time for a similar crime? Not a rhetorical question, I'm genuinely curious though my instinct is to say 'never'.

The only one I can think of was Anthony Levandowski for stealing Waymo's trade secrets but he was pardoned a few months later.

That's not really a similar crime; that's a crime against another corporation.

Re: Google illegally underpaid thousands of workers

#35

Post by [deleted] »

Ansil849 wrote: post #14
bko wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The "wrist slaps" will make up for the entire amount that the offending party short-changed the workers and penalties on top of that not to mention the cost associated with litigation. So it's not economical for the offending parties to continue such behavior.

> So it's not economical for the offending parties to continue such behavior. Of course it is. The only needed change is to take adequate care to not leave incriminating evidence such as emails around.

[deleted]

Re: Google illegally underpaid thousands of workers

#37

Post by AlbertCory »

Personal Googler story: In Ads and in Search, at least as of 2010 or so, Google employed independent companies who hired "raters" to provide "ground truth" for the ML systems. For example, they would rate proposed ads for a given query, so that the ML system could learn from their "truth". For Search, they'd rate proposed search results for a given query. There was a whole pipeline to bring in the raters' results and use them.

Those "raters" were contractors to the independent companies, and had no Google privileges at all. They couldn't come to campus and eat at the cafes, for example. They had no direct contact with any Google employees. I helped a relative get hired as one of those. This was about 11 years ago.

These outside companies had minimal oversight from Google, by design. My cousin joined the Search rater company and was given a test problem, which was timed and they had max times allowed. When she finished, they said "sorry, you took too long, we're not paying you."

I raised a stink and HR sent a representative to meet with the Search people. I sat in. The Search people were obnoxious little corporate toadies who claimed they couldn't interfere with any particular contractor's case, because of the legal separation requirements.

I so enjoyed watching the HR rep calmly and politely tell them, "That's great! Good job, you guys! But you know... when you hire someone and they don't do a good job, your remedy is to fire them. Not to refuse to pay."

She got paid.

I can't make any general statements about what happens to everyone, but in this particular case, I can't complain at all about HR's handling.

Re: Google illegally underpaid thousands of workers

#39

Post by elliekelly »

toomuchtodo wrote: post #11
notJim wrote: post #8

> A whistleblower represented by Whistleblower Aid has filed a complaint about the alleged violations with the US Securities and Exchange Commission. Nice.

Hopefully they're getting paid [1] for their efforts! [1] https://www.sec.gov/whistleblower "The Commission is authorized by Congress to provide monetary awards to eligible individuals who come forward with high-quality original information that leads to a Commission enforcement action in which over $1,000,000 in sanctions is ordered. The range for awards is between 10% and 30% of the money collected." From this post…

It’s pretty messed up that “defrauding investors” is the legal action most likely to succeed in court and not, ya know, defrauding the people they actually defrauded.
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