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Judge rejects $324.5M settlement over Apple, Google hiring

reuters.com

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Re: Judge rejects $324.5M settlement over Apple, Google hiring

#71

Post by cscurmudgeon »

exstudent wrote: post #47
smtddr wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I deleted the comment you've replied to because of the rapid downvotes... but screw it... I'm putting it back here. Who needs karma anyway... To the rest of the public, we probably look like complaining oil or Walmart execs. While the rest of the general public is dealing with insane commutes and thankless/soul-crushing jobs, we got things like "The Social Network" movie, San Francisco gentrification issues, fancy ca…

Sure you're drinking your VOSS but can you afford a home in SF? I would say it's a middle class aspiration to raise a family near your work. You'd be in for an "insane commute" if you had 3 kids and tried to work in the valley. Engineer's pay pales in comparison to the value they create. That's an issue. Average office drone X probably shouldn't even have a job so yeah, they shouldn't expect to get paid as much as a…

Ask your politicians to remove artificial building restrictions which are helping only the landlords.

Re: Judge rejects $324.5M settlement over Apple, Google hiring

#72

Post by pedrocr »

Consultant32452 wrote: post #16
troydavis wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As an employer, I'd like to see it move right by two places. I'm not optimistic though.

It would be interesting to see an analysis of what the economic impact of these depressed wages has been. $3 Billion is probably not too far off the mark. Probably not $3 Billion directly to the programmers impacted, but definitely to the broader economy.

3B$ is around 11k$/year/programmer[1], which is less than a 10% raise at the salary levels these developers have. Sounds quite fair or even low for what they could have gotten had they decided to move.

[1] Assuming 4 years and 64000 developers, which after some googling seems to be what's at stake in the lawsuit

Re: Judge rejects $324.5M settlement over Apple, Google hiring

#73

Post by balls187 »

bkeroack wrote: post #69

The otherwise amazing book by Ben Horowitz (of Andreessen-Horowitz fame) called The Hard Thing About Hard Things has a chapter that basically lays out and encourages this type of illegal behavior (called "Is It Okay to Hire People from Your Friend's Company?"). It literally recommends that companies maintain a "do not hire" (aka "do not poach") list of other organizations from which HR is forbidden from recruiting. I…

Seems taken out of context.

Do not hire is different than do not poach.

The wisdom I subscribe to is, if you have common investors, it's bad form to actively poach from portfolio companies.

For companies that are later stage, it's bad form to poach key employee's from portfolio companies.

Do Not Hire agreements between companies, however, seem unreasonable, except when there is clear cause for conflict of interest.

Re: Judge rejects $324.5M settlement over Apple, Google hiring

#74

Post by exstudent »

cscurmudgeon wrote: post #71
exstudent wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure you're drinking your VOSS but can you afford a home in SF? I would say it's a middle class aspiration to raise a family near your work. You'd be in for an "insane commute" if you had 3 kids and tried to work in the valley. Engineer's pay pales in comparison to the value they create. That's an issue. Average office drone X probably shouldn't even have a job so yeah, they shouldn't expect to get paid as much as a…

Ask your politicians to remove artificial building restrictions which are helping only the landlords.

I agree that's a good idea but in the context of this story...

Who lives in this ultra expensive real estate? The execs stiffing the developers on pay while making bank on their work.

Re: Judge rejects $324.5M settlement over Apple, Google hiring

#75

Post by bkeroack »

balls187 wrote: post #73
bkeroack wrote: post #69

The otherwise amazing book by Ben Horowitz (of Andreessen-Horowitz fame) called The Hard Thing About Hard Things has a chapter that basically lays out and encourages this type of illegal behavior (called "Is It Okay to Hire People from Your Friend's Company?"). It literally recommends that companies maintain a "do not hire" (aka "do not poach") list of other organizations from which HR is forbidden from recruiting. I…

Seems taken out of context. Do not hire is different than do not poach. The wisdom I subscribe to is, if you have common investors, it's bad form to actively poach from portfolio companies. For companies that are later stage, it's bad form to poach key employee's from portfolio companies. Do Not Hire agreements between companies, however, seem unreasonable, except when there is clear cause for conflict of interest.

There is a difference between active poaching and simply getting a resume (or some other expression of interest) from somebody for an open position.

a) If you get sent a resume in response to an open req and you reject them based solely on the current employer of the applicant being a "friendly company" ("do not hire" list), that is illegal and wrong.

b) If you realize the applicant is from a "friendly company" and so you make a subtle threat along the lines of: "We are going to call your current employer to get a reference check before we decide to extend any offer, are you sure that's ok with you?" (also recommended in Horowitz's book), it's also wrong and unfair. I'm not a lawyer so I don't know if that is overtly illegal however.

Re: Judge rejects $324.5M settlement over Apple, Google hiring

#76

Post by olefoo »

"Those who do not remember history are doomed to repeat it." -Santayana

This is yet another iteration of American labor politics. That it involves workers with greater skills than in previous iterations is not germane. The reason that labor unions arose in the first place was that capitalists actively exploited workers. And, guess what? Capitalists still exploit workers, even when the workers tools are laptops and VMs rather than steam engines and Bessemer converters.

How easily we forget that our grandfathers fought and died for the forty-hour work week. How easily we give that up, because we're working for "disruptive startups".

If you want to know what previous iterations of no-hire agreements looked like; see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blacklist_(employment)

Re: Judge rejects $324.5M settlement over Apple, Google hiring

#77

Post by tptacek »

bkeroack wrote: post #75
balls187 wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Seems taken out of context. Do not hire is different than do not poach. The wisdom I subscribe to is, if you have common investors, it's bad form to actively poach from portfolio companies. For companies that are later stage, it's bad form to poach key employee's from portfolio companies. Do Not Hire agreements between companies, however, seem unreasonable, except when there is clear cause for conflict of interest.

There is a difference between active poaching and simply getting a resume (or some other expression of interest) from somebody for an open position. a) If you get sent a resume in response to an open req and you reject them based solely on the current employer of the applicant being a "friendly company" ("do not hire" list), that is illegal and wrong. b) If you realize the applicant is from a "friendly company" and s…

It is lawful to maintain a "do-not-hire" list of companies from which you disqualify candidates.

It is possibly even lawful to do that with the intent of avoiding poaching and ill will.

What's definitely not lawful is to conspire with the companies on that list to determine its makeup.

Re: Judge rejects $324.5M settlement over Apple, Google hiring

#78

Post by rgbrenner »

oblio wrote: post #62
suprgeek wrote: post #50

I had two concerns when this was made public: that this was a laughably low amount considering the scope of the collusion and the time-scale over which it happened. that it looks like a good deal to all the companies concerned on two fronts - 325 Million is a pittance compared to what Apple, Google or Adobe make in a month. and the perception of the non-tech folks that this is about the rich whining about not getting…

Don't get your facts mixed up. 325 million is quite close to what Adobe makes per month. Google and Apple are 10x-20x50x bigger.

Adobe made $290m last year https://finance.yahoo.com/q/is?s=ADBE&annual

Re: Judge rejects $324.5M settlement over Apple, Google hiring

#79

Post by Iftheshoefits »

smtddr wrote: post #19
justina1 wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I hope the perception leans more towards 'uber rich tech execs conspired to pay their employees less' and not 'some of the best paid employees complain about how little they make'.

I deleted the comment you've replied to because of the rapid downvotes... but screw it... I'm putting it back here. Who needs karma anyway... To the rest of the public, we probably look like complaining oil or Walmart execs. While the rest of the general public is dealing with insane commutes and thankless/soul-crushing jobs, we got things like "The Social Network" movie, San Francisco gentrification issues, fancy ca…

It's easy to explain to lower/middle-class Americans outside of tech who are in union jobs. That's because they understand that one thing a robust union does is help prevent (or at least mitigate) this kind of collusion before it starts. My wife earns 1/3 of my salary, but does a far more important job for society. She comes from a state in which the unions used to be strong. She immediately understood what the implications of this collusion were, and didn't need me to even explain why the lawsuit is a good thing.

They understand that different workers earn different salaries, and they get that "paid below fair market wage" means what it means, regardless of what "fair market wage" is the calibration.

But we can't have unions or talk of unions in the software industry, because that might upset the rather hilariously mistaken insider perception of this industry as being a meritocracy.

Re: Judge rejects $324.5M settlement over Apple, Google hiring

#80

Post by mindcrime »

bkeroack wrote: post #69

The otherwise amazing book by Ben Horowitz (of Andreessen-Horowitz fame) called The Hard Thing About Hard Things has a chapter that basically lays out and encourages this type of illegal behavior (called "Is It Okay to Hire People from Your Friend's Company?"). It literally recommends that companies maintain a "do not hire" (aka "do not poach") list of other organizations from which HR is forbidden from recruiting. I…

It really disgusted me when I read it. Such smart people doing such dumb things, and encouraging would-be CEOs to do the same.

Wow, just wow. I'm reading that same book, but haven't gotten to that part yet. All I can say is... we (Fogbeam Labs) would never, ever, ever do something like this. When the day comes that we have money to hire employees, we are going with a strict policy of "We will poach anyone, anytime, from anywhere. If you want to keep your employees, treat them well enough that they won't want to leave".

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