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Google Moves to Address Wage Equity, and Finds It’s Underpaying Many Men

nytimes.com

311–320 of 626 posts

Re: Google Moves to Address Wage Equity, and Finds It’s Underpaying Many Men

#311

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why not? Just publish who makes how much money. That’s it.

Compare two developers. One just codes and the other not only knows how to code but knows how to debug (native, runtimes, etc.). So, then you publish developer 1's pay salary and developer 2's pay salary. Now, developer 1 has a rage-boner because developer 2 is being paid more but there's the reason of his/her desirable skills being utilised in the role. Yet, developer 1 doesn't see this qualifiable reason and just s…

not to mention the fact that there may be a junior developer 1a at a lower tier that can do everything developer 2 can do (and better) that is getting paid massively less...

Re: Google Moves to Address Wage Equity, and Finds It’s Underpaying Many Men

#312
post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure, but there's zero data to suggest either of those are a factor at Google. That's just moving the goal post.

How is that moving the goal post? The question at hand is whether individuals are fairly compensated based on their amount of experience and ability to contribute. Compensation is affected by job title, therefore job title is absolutely relevant.

>Compensation is affected by job title, therefore job title is absolutely relevant.

Levels (on hiring) can be affected by negotiation. You can, quite literally, negotiate a better level before signing the employment contract.

Why Miss Ellis' level was only Level 3 and everyone around her seemed to be hired at a Level 4, I won't even presume to know but I think it is a disservice to argue over facets surrounding something not publicly known specifically because those facts aren't known.

For example, the man that was hired - after Ms. Ellis was hired - was also hired four years after he graduated university and came on at Level 4.

Did he graduate with a master's? Did he have the same (or more) experience dev'ing? Is there any other plausible reason than the nefarious one we assume?

If not, then, sure let's deride away.

If so, then are we saying that prior experience and education level[s] (or quality) should not matter? That there should be a "maximum minimum level" for all workers entering the force?

Re: Google Moves to Address Wage Equity, and Finds It’s Underpaying Many Men

#313

The gender wage gap is real in the sense that there is a gap, but when you analyze it, they are comparing apples to oranges. I'm sure everyone here knows this. https://data.oecd.org/earnwage/gender-wage-gap.htm The countries with the highest wage gaps are the countries with the most equality in the workplace. Women in Korea are not treated poorly. The important thing though is the people proposing that the wage gap i…

Actually I find that table a bit suspicious. The sequence of countries ordered by pay gap (lowest to highest) is the following:

Romania, Costa Rica, Luxembourg, Belgium, Bulgaria, Greece, Slovenia, Italy, Denmark, Turkey, Norway, New Zealand, Colombia, Malta, Hungary, Poland, France, Iceland, Ireland, Mexico, Spain, Lithuania, Cyprus, Netherlands, Portugal, Australia, Switzerland, Slovak Republic, Germany, Czech Republic, Austria, Finland, United Kingdom, Canada, United States, Chile, Latvia, Israel, Japan, Estonia, Korea.

See the pattern there? Neither do I. Usually there is some correlation by continent, cultural area, GDP, HDI, etc. In this case there seems to be nothing. Romania and Costa Rica and Luxembourg are the countries with the smallest wage gap; Netherlands, UK and US are way up there, in company of Chile, Canada and Estonia. Turkey is wedged right in between Denmark and Norway. Netherlands' pay gap is 4 times that of neighbouring Belgium. Mexico and Ireland are the same. Lithuania's gap is half that of Estonia and Latvia. Strange.

Re: Google Moves to Address Wage Equity, and Finds It’s Underpaying Many Men

#314

High school, college, any STEM fields are all overwhelmingly biased in terms of favoring women. 57% of college graduates are women. Men are not only getting the short end of the stick but are being told by every voice that they are privileged, it’s their fault, they are bad whereas women have sooooo many extra programs and positive reinforcement to succeed. No one with a straight face can tell me women in entry level…

High school, college, any STEM fields are all overwhelmingly biased in terms of favoring women. My daughter who is finishing the primary school has recently asked me if it's okay if she doesn't like math, but likes animals and babies. Sounds like some pressure is being applied...

I hope you told her that liking math is not a prerequisite to liking animals and babies. Surely these interests can be decoupled - unless she has some kind of socio-mathematical synesthesia.

Re: Google Moves to Address Wage Equity, and Finds It’s Underpaying Many Men

#315

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Given that Google's workforce is 69% men, it's quite possible that they found 3 men underpaid for every 2 women who were underpaid (60%/40%), which would mean they gave more men than women salary equity adjustments while still having a bias in the direction of the original complaint.

It's not a contest of who is more underpaid. This would indicate that Google systematically underpays, regardless of gender. THAT is the real issue here.

When Men are being discriminated its not a contest but when women are, it is?

Re: Google Moves to Address Wage Equity, and Finds It’s Underpaying Many Men

#316

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> No one with a straight face can tell me women in entry level tech programs are not incredibly favored. All my below average coder friends that are women got awesome jobs with high salaries extremely easily. Yes, I talk with them and they agree with what I’m saying. .... and yet, how many workplaces have an engineering team which are 50% female? 25% female? 10% female? 5% female?

How many schools have 50% make teachers? Is it because education has a rampant sexism problem? Or is it because men and women have different preferences?

Anecdotal of course, but I have an education degree. Also learned to code. (Also, am male.)

Why am I not a teacher but instead a programmer?

Money. I feel, as a male, I need to be the "bread winner". Sure, that's something society has imposed on me — or perhaps I allowed to impose on me. But there you are.

If other men feel as I do, they may be drawn away from the notoriously underpaid field of education.

Too bad. If money were not in the equation, I am fairly sure I would have found more personal satisfaction from that career than the one I chose.

Re: Google Moves to Address Wage Equity, and Finds It’s Underpaying Many Men

#317
post #203

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why not? Just publish who makes how much money. That’s it.

And I'll point out that state governments often do this, and it seems to work fine for them.

I'm not sure we have the same definition of "fine" - government workers are usually not a shining light when it comes to motivation, productivity, etc.

Re: Google Moves to Address Wage Equity, and Finds It’s Underpaying Many Men

#318
post #238

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And so does the ability of talented individuals to negotiate their own salaries.

of individuals talented at negotiating* not necesarily talented at doing the job

There will always be exceptions.

But I don't think most people go to an interview without having googled "how to ..." about the interview process first. Thus even those not naturally talented at negotiation have a reasonable chance at negotiating decently.

Talent/job competence + a little bit of research and preparation prior to interviewing will ensure superior results IMHO.

Re: Google Moves to Address Wage Equity, and Finds It’s Underpaying Many Men

#319

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Compare two developers. One just codes and the other not only knows how to code but knows how to debug (native, runtimes, etc.). So, then you publish developer 1's pay salary and developer 2's pay salary. Now, developer 1 has a rage-boner because developer 2 is being paid more but there's the reason of his/her desirable skills being utilised in the role. Yet, developer 1 doesn't see this qualifiable reason and just s…

There are plenty of places with pay transparency and they work just fine. The information imbalance is only to the benefit of the employer.

>There are plenty of places with pay transparency and they work just fine. The information imbalance is only to the benefit of the employer.

Citations?

Re: Google Moves to Address Wage Equity, and Finds It’s Underpaying Many Men

#320

High school, college, any STEM fields are all overwhelmingly biased in terms of favoring women. 57% of college graduates are women. Men are not only getting the short end of the stick but are being told by every voice that they are privileged, it’s their fault, they are bad whereas women have sooooo many extra programs and positive reinforcement to succeed. No one with a straight face can tell me women in entry level…

Dr. Jordan Peterson has much to say about this in terms of Psychology [1]

[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WOjzCi9wIhE

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