Google Ends Forced Arbitration for Employees • Hacker News Board

Re: Google Ends Forced Arbitration for Employees

#91

Post by ChuckMcM » Thu, Feb 21, 2019, 11:26 PM UTC

JohnFen wrote: post #62

m0zg wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>> overly expansive ownership claim Yeah, that particular clause gave me a looong pause before signing their contract, in fact I even seriously considered taking one of the other offers I had. This is why you see all those "happens to be owned by Google" disclaimers on open source projects. This means the person wrote this code on their own time, yet it's owned by Google anyway, which IMO is total employee-hostile bu…

> I would not sign something like that contract today. I've been seeing wording to that effect in nearly every contract I've been presented with for years now. Every time, I speak up and suggest replacing it with wording that is much more restrictive (they can own anything I make using their resources or intellectual property, otherwise I own it). I have yet to have a company not agree to this change.

An acquaintance of mine who was given an offer by Google, and arrived on the appointed day, brought the agreement, a red line, and a clean copy. They refused to make any change in their wording even though they said their intent was not to enforce the wording as written. They said that they couldn't sign it unless Google's intent was actually in the writing as well. That afternoon, Google asked for all the gear they had been issued back and rescinded their offer of employment.

Google's statement was that Google would not make any changes in the employment agreement and signing the agreement was a condition of employment, thus by refusing to sign the agreement, this person had 'voluntarily' chosen not to work at Google.

Can't really argue with their reasoning.

Re: Google Ends Forced Arbitration for Employees

#92

Post by asark » Thu, Feb 21, 2019, 11:26 PM UTC

briandear wrote: post #36

riffraff wrote: post #19

Why isn't forced arbitration illegal? You're effectively agreeing to renounce to your rights to sue a company. Seems odd that US laws allows that. Or, is the clause only that arbitration has to be attempted but not binding to the fact that an agreement may be reached? This case would seem far less evil.

> You're effectively agreeing.. You are agreeing. As an adult, the choice to agree or not agree to conditions of a private transaction seem to be a fundamental liberty. If people didn’t agree and it affected recruitment, then companies would respond accordingly. Also, without arbitration, conceivably that could result in a lower offered salary to offset the risk of litigation. Given that the vast majority of employee…

> You are agreeing. As an adult, the choice to agree or not agree to conditions of a private transaction seem to be a fundamental liberty.

1. There's already plenty of stuff you're not allowed to sign away, no matter how much more "free" being able to do so might make you. I certainly bristle daily at how un-free I am not being able to sign myself into slavery.

2. OK fine. So we ban corporations from entering into forced arbitration contracts with individuals. You still can. With your neighbor or whoever. You can try with a corporation, but will find that they aren't permitted to. Since we collectively via the power of government conjure corporations from the aether, eff 'em.

Re: Google Ends Forced Arbitration for Employees

#93

Post by CharlesColeman » Thu, Feb 21, 2019, 11:27 PM UTC

anth_anm wrote: post #46

sand500 wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure but let anyone do voluntary arbitration not forced.

If two companies of comparable size want to agree to arbitrate any disputes in a contact, that should be allowed. It saves massive amounts of time and money. The problem is the disparity between the parties involved when it's a company and an individual. Forced arbitration also bans class action lawsuits, which weakens individuals even further.

I think forced arbitration should only be legal in actively negotiated contracts (i.e. both parties were active in writing and modifying all the terms), where the proposing party disclosed the implications in plain language, and where agreeing to it was entirely optional for either party (sort of like GDPR consent).

I think those conditions would effectively exclude it from consumer contracts while permitting it when both parties understand and want it.

Re: Google Ends Forced Arbitration for Employees

#94

Post by srkmno » Thu, Feb 21, 2019, 11:27 PM UTC

JohnFen wrote: post #73

srkmno wrote: post #52

Whatever your thoughts about arbitration there is no denying that it's the quicker and cheaper method, what this unfortunate development accomplishes is enlarging the pool of well to do clients and plaintiffs for the lawyers to exploit. In a related note: organized labor almost killed the US car industry, when economical foreign cars got popular, domestic car companies couldn't quickly make the necessary adjustments…

> there is no denying that it's the quicker and cheaper method I don't think anyone is disputing that. The problem is that "cheaper" and "faster" comes with the cost of injustice. > Labor unions are adversarial to change and innovation and especially in this era there is no place for them Why not? What replaces them? The entire point of unions is to try to correct the serious power imbalance between employer and empl…

1. I can't take seriously someone who writes "the cost of injustice" in this context.

2. When unions muddle the machinations of corporate management and production ultimately shutting the whole thing down surely they will be happy about the power balance they achieved.

In a free market an employee's own abilities and the dynamism of the economy determines their value. So the trick is to invest in one's education and coming up with policies that keep the economy chugging at a healthy pace, labor unions is not such a policy.

Re: Google Ends Forced Arbitration for Employees

#95

Post by danans » Thu, Feb 21, 2019, 11:27 PM UTC

ChuckMcM wrote: post #10

Wow, you mean collective employee action can be used to force an employer to stop exploitative behaviors? Who knew? :-) I'm really glad to hear that Google made this step, now if they would drop the overly expansive ownership claim in their employment agreement and the right to surveillance on personal property it would be a much more employee friendly place. I also hope that it gives them an edge in hiring which wou…

> Wow, you mean collective employee action can be used to force an employer to stop exploitative behaviors? Who knew? :-)

I think part of the problem is that we non-organized workers (i.e. most tech workers and our similar peers) have accepted the unfortunate media-fueled trope that collective worker action equates to organized-crime connected unions like those of the Hoffa-period Teamsters.

Unfortunately, many white collar workers also don't want to be associated with the image of people in hard hats, even though their power relationship with their employers is not that different from those of blue collar workers. Acknowledging this would mean acknowledging the existence structural impediments to their career advancement that make the chances of their entering the C-suite very low, and that's a bitter pill to swallow.

The vast majority of worker unions (nurses, teachers, international brotherhood of X, etc, etc) are completely above-board organizations.

Also, this outcome demonstrates that there are many forms of collective action that are not full unions. The degree of organization needed depends on the circumstances (The early strong manufacturing labor unions emerged partially as a result of violent repression of worker protests by companies).

One could even argue that the anti-poaching class-action lawsuit against large SV companies many years ago was itself a form of collective action.

Re: Google Ends Forced Arbitration for Employees

#96

Post by m0zg » Thu, Feb 21, 2019, 11:28 PM UTC

JohnFen wrote: post #89

m0zg wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Google will flat out refuse. In their view they own the entirety of your intellectual output for the duration, whether or not it's done on your own time and resources, and whether or not it's in any way related to your day job. I mean I get it (sort of), early on there wasn't really any "moat" to protect the business, so they had to put shit like this in their contracts lest someone goes off and upends their entire b…

> Google will flat out refuse. Fair enough, they can decide their terms. Honestly, I wouldn't be interested in working for Google in the first place, but if I were, that would put an immediate end to my interest.

Google can be fun if you make it a point to work on stuff that actually matters and not just rest and vest. But I do wish they'd reconsider their abusive IP clauses. Which they won't until they begin to struggle with hiring good people.

Re: Google Ends Forced Arbitration for Employees

#97

Post by dragonwriter » Thu, Feb 21, 2019, 11:29 PM UTC

JohnFen wrote: post #90

dragonwriter wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> This means the person wrote this code on their own time What is “your own time” as a salaried employee payed for work product not hours on the job site?

That would be the time when I am not doing company work.

But that is absolutely useless rule to use when the whole point of determining if work is done on your own time is to determine if the work done is legally your work or company work, since it becomes a circular argument.

Re: Google Ends Forced Arbitration for Employees

#98

Post by m0zg » Thu, Feb 21, 2019, 11:30 PM UTC

dragonwriter wrote: post #86

m0zg wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>> overly expansive ownership claim Yeah, that particular clause gave me a looong pause before signing their contract, in fact I even seriously considered taking one of the other offers I had. This is why you see all those "happens to be owned by Google" disclaimers on open source projects. This means the person wrote this code on their own time, yet it's owned by Google anyway, which IMO is total employee-hostile bu…

> This means the person wrote this code on their own time What is “your own time” as a salaried employee payed for work product not hours on the job site?

You don't understand. Google claims ownership even on the stuff that you do on _your own_ time, like nights and weekends, without using _any_ Google resources. Even if this stuff is in no way related to what you do at work.

Re: Google Ends Forced Arbitration for Employees

#99

Post by ergothus » Thu, Feb 21, 2019, 11:31 PM UTC

perfmode wrote: post #82

ergothus wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not saying unions won't work...I'm saying they weren't involved in this case. This case doesn't look particularly repeatable WITHOUT unions.

Why doesn't it look repeatable?

Rephrasing from my original comment: Because Google worried about a very supply-limited audience (tech workers, including related non-programmers). Most fields, the ones paying their employees far less and with far fewer perks, don't share that restraint. If these other fields had their current crop of (non-unionized) workers get disgusted, the companies would just get different employees.

There's no shortage of companies with various abusive practices that remain in business. Arbitration agreements, micro-management, strict controls over things as simple as bathroom breaks, even riding the line on wage-theft. I'm very glad to see this particular change, but to say "Google's programmers demanded change and got it, why don't you get with it, un-unionized cashiers at S-Mart!" overestimates the influence of those workers.

Re: Google Ends Forced Arbitration for Employees

#100

Post by sjjshvuiajhz » Thu, Feb 21, 2019, 11:34 PM UTC

JohnFen wrote: post #68

Symmetry wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Averaged across distinct contracts (as opposed to contract-instances) forced arbitration is a very good thing. If Google and Microsoft get into a dispute about the meaning of some agreement they signed they it's far better that they get some third party to quickly resolve the issue than that they have to spend years and millions of dollars in legal fees fighting it out in the courts. It's only when these agreements a…

> Averaged across distinct contracts (as opposed to contract-instances) forced arbitration is a very good thing. Forced arbitration is a very good thing for the employers. It's not a good thing for the employees, who are effectively signing away a huge swath of rights.

The parent may agree with you, but they said that in a somewhat obscure way. I believe their point is that companies have many distinct contracts with other companies (good) that contain arbitration clauses, and that employers have a smaller number of distinct contracts with employees (bad) that are duplicated thousands of times over.