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Google illegally underpaid thousands of workers

theguardian.com

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Re: Google illegally underpaid thousands of workers

#251

Post by burlesona »

CameronNemo wrote: post #236
burlesona wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

All employees would include execs obviously. I admit it's unorthodox and might feel a little unfair, but I imagine for these big tech companies that are so often guilty of just ignoring the law and paying fines to make their problems "go away," having the employees be furious at the bosses would be a far, far more effective punishment. In terms of dollars, I don't think it would take much to make the point. Suppose y…

But what does fining the low level employees accomplish? They can't really change the direction of the company in many cases.

Thats not really true. The middle and lower layers of the company is where the actual work happens, and if the people carrying out the work suddenly perceive there’s a personal risk to doing illegal things - even if it’s just a small fine - they’re much more likely to push back or quit. Meanwhile upper management may not care about a billion dollar fine that their spreadsheet says is “worth it,” but their life will be miserable if all the employees underneath them are pissed off, 10% quit, and nobody wants to work there. It’s a much, much bigger risk to upper management to infuriate their workforce than it is to write a check.

That’s the thing I think most people don’t understand about large companies. Money is just a number, they’re playing a game with it. If the company pays a huge fine, all those folks are still rich and nothing bad happens to them, they just have a few different numbers on their spreadsheet. That’s why they don’t care. It’s not like a normal person getting fined, who then loses the opportunity to use their money for things that matter to them.

If we want to hold corporations accountable, we have to issue punishments to corporations that actually hurt their leaders.

Re: Google illegally underpaid thousands of workers

#252

Post by burlesona »

Aeolun wrote: post #247
burlesona wrote: post #231

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A fair point, but doesn't this happen already? My experience working in a large corporation is that there's a pervasive "us vs. them" mentality when it comes to outside auditors, inspectors, etc., as well as a mindset that "they're just here to make our life harder," via imposed red tape, controls, etc. If this was really an issue perhaps there could be a whistleblower provision stating that anyone who assists with a…

I think my problem is that while I may be happy to throw my bosses boss under the bus (he has it coming), Jim from accounting has a family with 5 kids, and he really needs the money. So I’ll just keep quiet about everything. I do agree there’s an us/them mentality, but that breaks down when people feel like they can air out their grievances against senior management without sinking the company itself.

That’s fair but this is why I’m suggesting token penalties. Like parking ticket sized. People are extremely loss averse, so that’s enough to really bother them (thus deter behavior) while it shouldn’t be enough to genuinely hurt Jim in accounting.

Re: Google illegally underpaid thousands of workers

#253

Post by nerdponx »

CameronNemo wrote: post #235
stephenhuey wrote: post #143

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wow, at what point do their profits balloon enough that Google's moat is no longer intimidating enough to fend off a gold rush of people willing to pour heaps of money and ingenuity into outdoing their search product? I've been searching with Google since the beginning and it definitely feels worse than in the days of yore, yet they make more money than ever...

Who has access to the amount of data that Google does? Microsoft and Apple come to mind, but they are already profitable for their own reasons so may not want to risk their current profit centers doing the "shady" work Google is known for (not necessarily saying Google is evil/shady, but their products have a reputation).

Microsoft pretty clearly does "shady" stuff with all the Windows desktop telemetry and ads.

Re: Google illegally underpaid thousands of workers

#254

Post by randomswede »

zamfi wrote: post #90
AlbertCory wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've always thought the phrase "the exception that proves the rule" is nonsense, btw. There's no such "proof."

I think the intent behind the modern usage of "the exception that proves the rule" is that: a) the rule is a heuristic, not a hard-and-fast rule, and b) the notability of exceptions suggests that the heuristic is pretty good. In other words, if the exception is, in fact, exceptional, it reinforces that the heuristic is reasonably valid for non-exceptional cases. In this case, the fact that it took the intervention of…

And the "proof" used is an archaic term that means "test". The same word occurs in discussing alcohol strength ("100 proof") and in "proof standard" (the standard[1] that you use to compare against).

The German cognate would be "prüfen", the Swedish probably "pröva".

So, the exception tests the rule.

[1] And the standard is, of course, a reference exemplar of some sort.

Re: Google illegally underpaid thousands of workers

#255

Post by advisedwang »

dekhn wrote: post #63

It continues to impress me that Google says it hires smart people, trains them not to put incriminating evidence in emails (really), and then hires managers who then put an entire chain into email (probably also archived as a group) and get the company written up on the front page of the NY Times (the very criteria they try to scare you with).

Perhaps those people are prioritizing making sure they personally have done the right thing (or more cynically, are covering their own asses) over shielding Google.

Re: Google illegally underpaid thousands of workers

#256

Post by Fnoord »

randomswede wrote: post #254
zamfi wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the intent behind the modern usage of "the exception that proves the rule" is that: a) the rule is a heuristic, not a hard-and-fast rule, and b) the notability of exceptions suggests that the heuristic is pretty good. In other words, if the exception is, in fact, exceptional, it reinforces that the heuristic is reasonably valid for non-exceptional cases. In this case, the fact that it took the intervention of…

And the "proof" used is an archaic term that means "test". The same word occurs in discussing alcohol strength ("100 proof") and in "proof standard" (the standard[1] that you use to compare against). The German cognate would be "prüfen", the Swedish probably "pröva". So, the exception tests the rule. [1] And the standard is, of course, a reference exemplar of some sort.

Yeah, or for example in Dutch 'scheikundeproef' or 'natuurkundeproef' which we did at high school: a test involving the laws of chemistry or physics respectively.

Re: Google illegally underpaid thousands of workers

#257

Post by pertymcpert »

ffggvv wrote: post #241
cylde_frog wrote: post #146

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's funny how arrogant you seem to have gotten working at Google. Looking through your post history a couple of years ago you were doing grunt work you would see as below you now. The belief that all Google employees are doing hard innovative work is untrue. A large portion are centering divs and wrangling JSON.

this account has had multiple owners.. i’ve never done grunt work

Why?
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