Google tries to fix "Gender Pay Gap"... learns it’s been underpaying men

[Andrew NDB]

And then they had to raise their pay.

https://pluralist.com/google-gender-pay-gap-underpaying-men/

[CylonsKlingonsDaleksOhMy]

And then they had to raise their pay.

https://pluralist.com/google-gender-pay-gap-underpaying-men/

Inconceivable!

[snake]

This really makes my day.

[DarkFell]

Inconceivable!
Vizzini.. is that you?

[CylonsKlingonsDaleksOhMy]

Vizzini.. is that you?

https://media.giphy.com/media/gOv3Mq6WQwrS/200.gif

[Wesley]

Hilarious.

[Prowler]

Hilarious.

Came in to say the exact same thing :P

[Sumac]

I wonder will left sources report it?
And if they will, what kind of spin they put on it?

[FredWolfLeonardo]

How dare you question the gender pay gap!

[CylonsKlingonsDaleksOhMy]

What is the sexual orientation of these underpaid men?

[Prowler]

What is the sexual orientation of these underpaid men?


I know you're joking, but I wouldn't be surprised if one of these days people will begin getting asked those type of questions at job interviews. So much supposed progress yet this kind of crap is actually making us regress.

[Candy Kappa]

I don't really see the humor, the investigation showed that people was underpaid. And now they can be correctly paid.

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/04/technology/google-gender-pay-gap.html

[IndigoErth]

Where these men getting paid less because they chose lower paying positions than the women, didn't ask for raises as often, and took time off for their family?

Yes, I'm being snarky. Because that's usually the stuff people grab for when trying to explain away and defend women getting paid less, ignoring the "same job" part.

If they found a disparity and are making moves to correct it, great. I just hope the next company can handle it as simply when it's the other way around and not just flooded with comments to defend a gap instead. Because people always seem opposed to it being corrected when it's from that angle.

[Leo656]

"Same Job" is only one of a variety of factors, though. Nothing is ever truly "equal".

Like, remember when Jennifer Lawrence did a movie with Christian Bale, and was whining about the pay disparity? People laughed at her because of several things, not limited to but including 1. Her part in the movie was smaller than Bale's, and more importantly, 2. Bale is a Big Huge Star and a proven box office commodity, while J-Law is relatively Nobody and her drawing power dropped off huge after like, the second Hunger Games movie. And probably 3., She generally shows up to work tipsy or full-blown drunk a lot, and is a well-known chronic whiner/pain in the ass. If I were the producer on that project, and she came to me asking for the same pay as Bale, I'd sh*tcan her immediately just to prove a point.

Yes, there are disparities, but there always will be, because "equality" is a myth. All things in life are decided by a variety of variables, and thus there can never truly be a "level playing field". I'm generally in favor of everyone earning more money, though; within reason.

[IndigoErth]

Well, obviously in cases like that's it's going to vary, because talent, recognition, etc is involved. Art, anything that's a performance (including wrestling I assume?) and so on is a bit more individual than most jobs.

Now, on the other hand, if we're talking two programmers for Google who both sit at computers all day working in the same department and have been on the job for roughly a similar amount of years... ehhh... Either someone sucks a their job (and maybe should have moved on?) or there shouldn't be much disparity there in their compensation.

[neatoman]

And then they had to raise their pay.

https://pluralist.com/google-gender-pay-gap-underpaying-men/

OK, that's pretty funny.

[Leo656]

Well, obviously in cases like that's it's going to vary, because talent, recognition, etc is involved. Art, anything that's a performance (including wrestling I assume?) and so on is a bit more individual than most jobs.

Now, on the other hand, if we're talking two programmers for Google who both sit at computers all day working in the same department and have been on the job for roughly a similar amount of years... ehhh... Either someone sucks a their job (and maybe should have moved on?) or there shouldn't be much disparity there in their compensation.

There shouldn't be much of one, but there still would be, depending on the level of micro-managing that the boss likes to do. Who takes more bathroom breaks? Who calls out more often, sick or otherwise? A lot of things that some people may assume are strictly gender bias are generally just things that employers use to keep people down across the board.

Like my job has a sales quota system/scam. The quotas are ridiculous and in ten years nobody has ever hit one, but we don't get fired over it; it's just leverage so that if anyone asks for a raise, the boss can claim it isn't justified. "How can I justify giving you more money when you can't even hit the minimum requirements for the job?" It's transparent bullsh*t but nobody really worries about it since other places actually do fire you for not hitting the quota, even if they pay more, so we kinda just trade the extra dollar per hour for job security.

I will say, though, that my female co-worker, who's great at the job, also takes a lot of days for family/personal reasons, whereas I almost never even call out sick. If we both went in and asked for a raise on the same day, I expect that fact would be held against her, despite the fact that she's been doing this a lot longer than me. Things happen in life, but as an employer, who would you be more willing to open up the purse strings for - the person who just took three weeks off because of a death in the family, or the one who goes out of their way to be at work 6-7 days per week?

There are definitely some disparities, but upon closer inspection, a lot of it isn't "gender specific" aside from the fact that women generally ask for more time off or other things like that, and employers really don't want to be bothered with that. Whether it comes to pay or even hiring them to begin with, they're kind of high maintenance. That sounds discriminatory, maybe, but again, from an employer perspective, you really care less about gender and more about, "Which person is less likely to be a pain in the ass?" And in turn, they're going to predominantly hire and promote those people.

It all makes me pretty sure I would never want to actually run a business. Too many headaches, and you can be accused of all kinds of impropriety just for trying to keep things simple. I used to have grander aspirations, but I think middle-management is good enough for me.