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Google has discriminated against its female employees, according to the US Department of Labor (DoL), which said it had evidence of "systemic compensation disparities".
As part of an ongoing DoL investigation, the government has collected information that suggests the internet search giant is violating federal employment laws with its salaries for women, agency officials said.
"We found systemic compensation disparities against women pretty much across the entire workforce," Janette Wipper, a DoL regional director, testified in court in San Francisco on Friday.
Reached for comment Friday afternoon, Janet Herold, regional solicitor for the DoL, said: "The investigation is not complete, but at this point the department has received compelling evidence of very significant discrimination against women in the most common positions at Google headquarters."
Herold added: "The government's analysis at this point indicates that discrimination against women in Google is quite extreme, even in this industry."
Google strongly denied the accusations of inequities, claiming it did not have a gender pay gap.
Source: The Guardian
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Monday April 10 2017, @07:08PM (22 children)
Hey, Google. Don't be evil. How about . . .
Google strongly denied the accusations insisting its pay discrimination is NOT Extreme but merely Excessive.
Every performance optimization is a grate wait lifted from my shoulders.
(Score: 0, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Monday April 10 2017, @07:10PM (20 children)
Let's see the evidence. I trust Google more than the US Government.
(Score: 2) by bob_super on Monday April 10 2017, @07:46PM (9 children)
You won't see any evidence, because salaries or IRS files are not public.
If you trust a company with a financial interest in discrimination, over a government agency with easier targets than spending years fighting million-dollar lawyers, you should move to a different country.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday April 10 2017, @08:06PM (8 children)
Why does Google have a financial interest in discrimination? From a financial perspective, Google is just as motivated to pay less salary to men and women....I have worked in a US government agency and know first hand how incompetent they can be. But thanks for trying to make me feel unwelcome in my own home.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday April 10 2017, @08:10PM
> Why does Google have a financial interest in discrimination?
Because maintaining the status quo is always the short-term cheapest option.
(Score: 2) by bob_super on Monday April 10 2017, @08:14PM (5 children)
> just as motivated to pay less salary to men and women
Men in the Bay Area keep jumping ship to find more elsewhere. Are women, especially those responsible children logistics, as likely to be fickle?
> thanks for trying to make me feel unwelcome in my own home.
You're the one claiming more trust in a private for-profit privacy-invasion-as-business-case entity, than for your own my-constitution-is-the-bestestest government... Don't shoot the messenger.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by The Mighty Buzzard on Monday April 10 2017, @09:47PM (2 children)
Personally, I trust both of them. Granted I trust them both to fuck over anyone they get the chance to, but that's still a type of trust.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday April 10 2017, @11:27PM
No, that would be called "distrust".
Wait, in your case I think you might have the proper usage...
(Score: 2) by linkdude64 on Tuesday April 11 2017, @02:26PM
I will share one of my favorite one-liners of all time...
"You can't trust a dog, but you can trust a dog to be a dog."
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Monday April 10 2017, @10:47PM
Or women are negotiating for different perks instead of literal pay. Pay is only one factor in compensation and others can be much more expensive, but not pay.
(Score: 2, Insightful) by qzm on Tuesday April 11 2017, @04:36AM
>Men in the Bay Area keep jumping ship to find more elsewhere. Are women, especially those responsible children logistics, as likely to be fickle?
Actually, in that case paying the men more would more certainly not be 'discrimination', it would be required to retain a more difficult to retain asset.
Care to try again?
I suspect, actually, this whole thing is an attack on Googles tendency to scale pay based on 'results' (ignoring arguments about how results are measured)
versus seniority. Most feminists, and bureaucrats, think that a pure seniority based payment scheme is the ONLY fair method, and that payment based
on actual value of work is evil. This is where the whole 'pay gap' lie has been nurtured. It is based on the assumption that any person with degree X who
has been alive for Y years after getting that degree is worth the same pay - regardless of what they have done in the meantime, what their track record
looks like, how much personal time they tend to commit to the company, etc, etc.
In other words they desperately hate on the fact that men, with a higher average level of commitment to their career (for a number of very well understood
sociological reasons) get paid more on average than women, who for similar sociological reasons, have more choice and less pressure in that area.
In fact, figures that DO adjust for this show that men are almost ALWAYS paid less the women for a given level of ability/commitment.
This should surprise no one, as it is a direct result of a society which places more pressure on men to succeed financially and in their career, and less pressure
on women for the same.
In other words yes, there is usually a pay gap, to the detriment of MEN, as they have given up more to receive less.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by goody on Monday April 10 2017, @11:04PM
I'm sure it isn't in their business plan or on any Powerpoint slides to embrace discrimination, but as often happens in companies, it just happens. It happens by not having processes and policies in place to prevent it from happening. The Department of Labor has its faults, but in general they protect and favor workers and aren't some big brother agency with black helicopters. You all may be fans for Google for having a great search engine, a fast browser, and a mobile device OS with mass appeal, but it says nothing of their internal practices. While Google may espouse to do no evil and use this in major decisions at an executive and board level, it can be very difficult to apply and maintain this in thousands of daily decisions in middle management.
(Score: 2) by tangomargarine on Monday April 10 2017, @09:21PM (2 children)
Google is a for-profit company so you can deduce what their motivations are. Trust Google to act for the good of Google. Sometimes we get lucky and it coincides with our interests.
The government, on the other hand...theoretically they shouldn't really have any motivations. Our representatives should work solely to perform the will of the People. But of course 49% of the People are idiots ;)
"Is that really true?" "I just spent the last hour telling you to think for yourself! Didn't you hear anything I said?"
(Score: 2) by kaszz on Monday April 10 2017, @10:46PM (1 child)
I suspect the idiot quote is more like 80%..
Not that soylentnews is demographically representative by a long shot..
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday April 11 2017, @01:41AM
> I suspect the idiot quote is more like 80%..
Nope, it is exactly 44.4%.
(Score: 2) by srobert on Tuesday April 11 2017, @12:27AM
I don't trust either currently, but at least with the government, I get to vote for who runs it once in a while.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Tuesday April 11 2017, @02:29AM (5 children)
Where do you work that the people's salaries are commonly known? Our HR creature is very careful at every discussion of pay to tell you "Don't tell anyone else what you're getting!" Like, if you're making minimum wage, and get a 2 cent raise, it should be top secret, because all those other minimum wage flunkies will want the same 2 cents. Fek - a 2 cent or even 2% raise across the board will break the company? And, does that minimum wage flunkie REALLY believe that he's getting something special? Something special would be a 50% raise! A raise of 50% over minimum wage would put the average head of household up to the poverty line! THAT is special!
I've never visited a Google campus, but I'm willing to bet that few of their employees are at liberty to discuss wages.
(Score: 2) by slinches on Tuesday April 11 2017, @05:11AM (3 children)
Minimum wage jobs aren't intended to support a family. They are there to be a first job for young adults to begin working and gain some experience before starting a career. If those types of jobs aren't allowed to exist, then how will kids work their way through college or afford vocational training?
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Tuesday April 11 2017, @01:24PM (2 children)
Doesn't matter what they are "intended" to do. Facts are facts - corporate America forgot where they came from, and sold out their country, shipping good paying jobs to Outback Fuckistan, where people will work like a dog just to put food on the table. Do you know where your Levi's come from?
But, do you know what's WORSE than minimum wage? All those jobs that are exempt from minimum wage laws. Food service and wait staff first and foremost. Mysogenistic laws that ensure a single mother can never make ends meet if they rely on waitress work.
While everyone is worried about some prima donna at Google not getting as much money as the guy who was hired at the same time - NO ONE worries about women struggling to make ends meet at a job that doesn't even pay minimum wage.
(Score: 2) by slinches on Tuesday April 11 2017, @05:28PM (1 child)
What are you talking about with misogynist laws against waiters/servers? That's a job that is roughly evenly split between men and women, so even if the laws were put in place to harm them, it wouldn't be misogynistic. And secondly, the laws are in place because gratuity is a substantial portion of their income (often more than their base pay, much of which is unreported tax-free cash income) and applying minimum wage laws on top would severely distort the job market which includes non-tip based positions. So we need to either keep the laws as they are or change them to apply to wait-staff, but somehow get rid of tips.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Wednesday April 12 2017, @12:47AM
You've gotten the cart before the horse. Have you ever noticed that tipping doesn't take place in most of the rest of the world?
The REASON we tip wait staff, is that we exempted them from minimum wage laws when the minimum wage was dreamed up. Corruption reigned then, as always. Lobbyists worked hard to specifically exempt farm workers, food service, and wait staff from the laws, claiming that each of those groups received certain benefits on the job. When minimum wage was created, we established an entire separate class of workers who could be exploited independently of all other workers.
https://www.dol.gov/oasam/programs/history/flsa1938.htm [dol.gov]
The fact that the US has established a custom of "tipping" over the past 80 years or so doesn't make an inequitable wage law moral or just. The fact that most people in the US can't remember, and haven't been taught, how the law came to be, doesn't make that law moral or just. The US was slow to adopt minimum wages, just as it was slow to outlaw slavery. When it did adopt minimum wage, the US got things all wrong.
There is no justification for any exemption to minimum wage laws.
And, historically, as applied to wait staff, the law is indeed misogynistic. Male waiters have historically been paid more than females. Males have always had more choices, and males often move on from waiting to other work. Females often spend their entire careers in waitress work.
Read up on the history of the law before you tell me how fair it is.
(Score: 2) by urza9814 on Tuesday April 11 2017, @03:29PM
They most certainly are. HR will always *suggest*, sometimes quite strongly, that you do not discuss your salary. But legally they cannot prohibit you from doing so, nor can they punish you for doing so. I'd hope people working for Google are intelligent enough to realize this and to not be intimidated by some lying HR drone...assuming they actually wanted to of course.
(Score: 2) by kaszz on Monday April 10 2017, @10:43PM
You are totally wrong. They mean to say "Don't be evil (except if there a profit to be made)" ;-)
Google had their behavior quite straight until they got entangled with the political apparatus (by necessity) and got big.
(Score: 0, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Monday April 10 2017, @07:15PM (9 children)
And yet, even with this unshakably solid evidence, people will still deny that the pay gap exists. Sigh.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Monday April 10 2017, @07:20PM
What solid evidence?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday April 10 2017, @07:21PM
Is that a joke? Where is the "unshakably solid evidence"? All we have are accusations from Janet and Janette.
(Score: 4, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Monday April 10 2017, @07:22PM (2 children)
Of course it does not exist.
If you factor out all the differences, there is no gender difference in pay.
(Score: 3, Informative) by DeathMonkey on Monday April 10 2017, @08:55PM (1 child)
What was that about proof-by-repeated-assertion? (a bit down thread)
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday April 11 2017, @01:29AM
I think you missed the point of my post.
Parse the logic carefully, its a tautology.
You might not be the only one who missed it though.
You never know around here, lots of people who flatter themselves by claiming to be logical when they are really just willfully ignorant.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday April 10 2017, @10:43PM
I agree. So when do childless men get their raises to bring them to parity with childless women?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday April 10 2017, @11:37PM (2 children)
Sigh, the pay gap is real but the wage gap is not because gender discrimination is illegal. Men work hard to support their families, if you think this is something that needs addressing, you can fuck right off!
Equality of opportunity is possible and equality of outcome is not; Get it through your stupid little head!
(Score: 3, Insightful) by pnkwarhall on Tuesday April 11 2017, @01:17AM (1 child)
Equality of opportunity is possible and equality of outcome is not; Get it through your stupid little head!
Your insight is wasted if the attitude that accompanies it makes the listener want to disregard or completely ignore you.... anonymous coward.
Lift Yr Skinny Fists Like Antennas to Heaven
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday April 11 2017, @04:24AM
He has no insight, just deliberate misrepresentation of reality and his concomitant anger because of reality's well known liberal bias.
(Score: 2) by Grishnakh on Monday April 10 2017, @07:20PM (1 child)
Even if the accusations are false, as long as they stick and it causes a lot of harm to the company, I would categorize it as "the ends justify the means". After that, go after Apple and then Google. Hopefully, all three would be shut down and put out of business. Oh yeah, don't forget Oracle. And they might as well get Uber while they're at it. Heck, they might as well go after everyone that was involved in the no-poaching scandal a few years ago; all those companies suck.
(Score: 1) by kurenai.tsubasa on Monday April 10 2017, @08:16PM
Whatever it takes to get those womyn-born-womyn programmers to precipitate out of the æther.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday April 10 2017, @07:26PM (1 child)
Did they run the same analysis against the US government?
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Runaway1956 on Tuesday April 11 2017, @02:38AM
In my experience - the government pays a flat wage for each paygrade, and everyone seems to be promoted into the paygrades fairly evenly. You don't walk into a government office to find all white males, or all white with male and female mix, or all Asian. You walk in to find a pretty balanced mix of gender and race, and you have no idea who is in charge until someone tells you.
I will point out that at the Red Rive Army Depot, the genders and races do segregate just a little. Females are found inside of offices more, and males are found outside performing manual work more. And, skilled trades (welding) tend to see more white males than non-white or non-male. I suppose the government probably ought to recruit more black and female welders? Except, blacks and females are making very similar money in those occupations which they choose.
Now - if you want to analyze political offices and political appointees, that will be an entirely different story. Those people are highly prejudiced. Ivy League college, and all the right contacts, or you don't stand much of a chance. THOSE people are mostly hetero white males. But, don't dare mix them up with the working class people!!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday April 10 2017, @07:43PM
It's game of Poker Google, prepare to lose.
"I'll see your racism and Islamophobia, and raise you Misogyny!"
Throw labels around like it's nobody's business and see what happens to you.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by shanen on Monday April 10 2017, @07:43PM (15 children)
Mostly based on the book Work Rules! (though I've read a bunch of google-related books recently, most recently Dogfight about the smartphone war), I think this may actually reflect the extreme pay differentials based on results, where the best results are biased in favor of aggressive males (driven by all that testosterone). There could be at least four possible mechanisms: (1) Pure aggressive competitiveness producing the results, (2) Greater aggressiveness in claiming credit for the results, (3) Better work-life balance by the women, or (4) More willingness to join risky projects.
In conclusion, the entire google topic always saddens me. So much potential to make the world better and now completely undone by corporate cancerism, the American business philosophy that buried capitalism. The way it works now, freedom is the problem, so the most cheaply bribed politicians are paid to write the worse possible laws to benefit the biggest and most cancerous corporations. As the second referenced book puts it, the winner gets around 75% of the market and almost all of the profits and the losers struggle to stay in business at all. Real capitalism (especially in the fantasy world of the libertarians) would involve rewarding the winners by requiring them to reproduce (by cellular division) creating MORE choice and MORE freedom.
As it applies specifically to the google, the old corporate motto about EVIL has been replaced with "All your attention are belong to us." The mission statement has also mutated. There was too much information, so it got prioritized. The new mission statement is to make the advertising information available and the metric of utility is the profits of the corporations that are paying the google corporation. Any benefit to human beings has become rather incidental to the gawd-given mission of shareholder value.
#1 Freedom = (Meaningful - Coerced) Choice{5} ≠ (Beer^4 | Speech) and your negative mods prove you are a narrow prick.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday April 10 2017, @07:49PM (2 children)
Obviously, you cannot have capitalism when your society is built around an anti-capitalism organization.
(Score: 2, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Monday April 10 2017, @08:07PM
The most brilliant propagandist technique will yield no success unless one fundamental principle is borne in mind constantly and with unflagging attention. It must confine itself to a few points and repeat them over and over. Here, as so often in this world, persistence is the first and most important requirement for success. -- Adolf Hitler
(Score: 2) by bob_super on Monday April 10 2017, @08:08PM
Turns out there's too little profit in enforcing human dignity.
Feeding human parts (dead or alive) to carnivores could raise profit margins nicely...
(Score: 2, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Monday April 10 2017, @10:04PM (9 children)
Young males definitely have more social pressure to "move up the ladder". For the most part, men are judged on their wallets and women on looks. It may not be "fair", but that's how society currently works. Thus, young men bust their asses to get promotions in order to be the family bread-winner. If you don't factor this into the equation, you will skew the results.
If you give promotions to females just because they are females in order for the org to balance the genders, then frustrated males will leave the company for better opportunities.
I'm all for equal pay for equal work, but societal norms gum up the measuring.
(Score: 2) by kaszz on Monday April 10 2017, @11:00PM
And women can get payed for their looks.
I think it's called marriage, alimony, gifts or something like that ;-)
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday April 11 2017, @01:39AM (7 children)
If you give promotions to females just because they are females in order for the org to balance the genders, then frustrated males will leave the company for better opportunities.
And if you give promotions to males just because men are judged on their wallets, then frustrated females will seek enough political power to stop you from pulling that shit in the future.
I guess that's the difference between men and women, the men just give up and run away while the women do something about the problem.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Tuesday April 11 2017, @03:02AM (2 children)
You're high, right?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday April 11 2017, @05:20PM (1 child)
I guess that's the difference between men and women, the men just give up and run away while the women do something about the problem.
You're high, right?
Username checks out!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday April 11 2017, @11:12PM
Serious question: what point are you trying to make by attempting to mock someone's username in relation to their post? Usernames are chosen by the poster, so they're highly likely to be comfortable with the name they chose.
Without your answer, all I can divine from your attempt is a "your dumb!" retort.
(Score: 2) by Rivenaleem on Tuesday April 11 2017, @10:36AM (2 children)
Wait, isn't there a gender pay gap specifically because women have not done something about the problem?
(Score: 1) by kurenai.tsubasa on Tuesday April 11 2017, @01:57PM
Why would women want to do anything about this “problem?”
They certainly would not want the deal given to men: figure it out or starve to death in a gutter, I don't care how, and fuck you.
Nobody has a problem with men starving to death. Men are accountable for their own actions. If a man doesn't like his station in life, we tell him he can either STFU or work “harder.”
Everybody wants to coddle women. Women are not accountable for their own actions. If a woman doesn't like her station in life, it's everybody's fault except for hers, and it's everybody's responsibility to do something about it except hers.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday April 11 2017, @05:18PM
Wait, isn't there a gender pay gap specifically because women have not done something about the problem?
I don't know if you are joking or actually think that's an even remotely serious counter-argument.
But the gender pay gap has been massively reduced over the last 35 years. [pay-equity.org]
In 1980 women made 60% of what men made, today its nearly 80%.
That is the result of women working to fix the problem.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday April 11 2017, @06:02PM
What? Where did I say "just because"? I do believe the average male will work harder on getting a promotion because society pressures them to get a promotion and earn more. It's not about one gender being better than another.
The flip side is that on average females work much harder on their appearance than males because that's how society judges them. I'm just the messenger; I didn't make society.
(Score: 3, Disagree) by Runaway1956 on Tuesday April 11 2017, @02:56AM (1 child)
(3) Better work-life balance by the women
That is the biggest factor working against "women". It has been noted by a number of people that wages aren't gender biased, so much as they are mother-biased. Women who take maternity leave and/or longer absences to care for family are "left behind" by both male and female counterparts.
Forget about females for a moment. Let's look at males only. A young worker who takes his job casually will never be promoted. His class mate from high school who has become a workaholic, is going to get the raises and promotions. Joe the Workaholic dedicates himself to the job, while Bill Casual takes days off at random, and may or may not put forth extra effort to meet deadlines.
Bring the women back in. If I can expect the lady to give me 8 years of service over the next decade, why would I ensure that she earns the *same wages* over that decade, as Joe? She happens to be a pretty good worker, and she's obviously worth more than Bill Casual - but she's not worth a Joe.
Bring in another woman who has no desire to raise her own family, she may be Joe's equal. But - as you've already pointed out, women ARE more likely to "balance" their personal lives against their professional lives.
Bottom line, for me, is that women shouldn't expect to earn the same money that men earn, UNLESS they are willing to beat men out in all respects.
But, hey - let's remember that women live longer than men. They WILL get their revenge when they are tossing clods of dirt on our caskets.
(Score: 2) by shanen on Wednesday April 12 2017, @08:39AM
I think I disagree with your conclusion, but I have thought that women (and men) should be allowed to postpone their careers without penalty for the sake of their children. Of course, that would sort of be predicated on companies having jobs that people want to keep working at beyond the fixed age of retirement, whereas today's reality, especially in technical companies, is to get rid of old people as quickly as possible, without anything resembling mercy or regret.
Value of wisdom? Veneration for experience? Silly old notions.
#1 Freedom = (Meaningful - Coerced) Choice{5} ≠ (Beer^4 | Speech) and your negative mods prove you are a narrow prick.
(Score: 2, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Monday April 10 2017, @07:45PM (2 children)
Is this not a business relationship made between consenting adults?
Are women incompetent fools who need the white-knight patriarchy to keep them safe from exploitation?
Give me a break.
Hey, ladies. Grow some balls and learn to negotiate better.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday April 11 2017, @07:50AM (1 child)
Hey, ladies. Grow some balls
Are you acknowledging that the system is stacked against women and in favor of men? Testicles *are* a prerequisite?
(Score: 3, Touché) by c0lo on Tuesday April 11 2017, @10:36AM
Not from what I understand.
To me is seems the poster indicates that any round-like shapes will do. Perhaps some... mmm... melons?
(grin)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 2) by Lagg on Monday April 10 2017, @07:53PM (2 children)
I have it on good account that some Google depts even handed out inclusiveness stickers. Some kind of homebrew gender icon. Kind of like the trans one but not. They're also big fans of putting pie charts and stuff out about how inclusive they are and how they're always working to correct this issue.
Regardless of what your thoughts on the matter are. You must admit it's pretty funny that it's usually the companies putting this stuff forward that are the ones that end up accused of doing it. Is it because it's only the unholy-massive companies that have enough warm bodies to not care about individual value?
Marc Pilotin, a DoL attorney, said: “For some reason or another, Google wants to hide the pay-related information.”
In a statement to the Guardian, Google said: “We vehemently disagree with [Wipper’s] claim. Every year, we do a comprehensive and robust analysis of pay across genders and we have found no gender pay gap. Other than making an unfounded statement which we heard for the first time in court, the DoL hasn’t provided any data, or shared its methodology.”
This is amusing on multiple levels. Like Google has any place to complain about such things. But I digress. The real kicker is right here. Shows exactly how these companies - and Google - think about this. Numbers.
Google began releasing diversity statistics in 2014 and reported last year that women made up 31% of its overall workforce and that only 2% of workers were black and 3% Latino. White employees accounted for 59% of the US workforce and Asians made up 32%.
At this point I'm creating a list of companies to thank for directly elevating Trump and legitimizing his politics before I start thanking individuals for doing so. Going to start my door-to-door thanking campaign in the Bay area near Google's campus, and spread out in a spiral motion to lesser players' offices like Symantec and Mozilla. It makes sense right?
http://lagg.me [lagg.me] 🗿
(Score: 3, Insightful) by nobu_the_bard on Monday April 10 2017, @09:53PM (1 child)
Google began releasing diversity statistics in 2014 and reported last year that women made up 31% of its overall workforce and that only 2% of workers were black and 3% Latino. White employees accounted for 59% of the US workforce and Asians made up 32%.
Thing about this quote is there's no context. In the places Google has employees, are those numbers reflective of the actual availability? Are they representative of some huge missed opportunity - are there huge numbers of Latino people with the sort of training Google wants, that it isn't hiring, in favor of whites and Asians?
I assume the author wants you to assume there is a roughly even balance of human resources available, but the quote gives no context to establish that it means anything besides what it says it all. It's not a useful quote.
(Score: 2) by Lagg on Tuesday April 11 2017, @01:15AM
It's precisely as useful as its source for starting a discussion. [google.com]
How 'bout that pepsi commercial though gais. A real conversation starter if there ever was one. Real shiny.
http://lagg.me [lagg.me] 🗿
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Monday April 10 2017, @08:07PM (15 children)
Its funny to read the comments on stories like these. The general Soylent commentariat are tinfoil-levels of paranoid when it comes to Google's behavior, and to the left of Lenin on how much the government is allowed to police speech. But, I guess it just takes the right alignment of opressor and opressee to turn them into red-blooded MUH FREEDOMS reactionaries.
How mercenary are the sympathies of the modern man.
(Score: 2) by Grishnakh on Monday April 10 2017, @08:21PM (4 children)
You're making the classic mistake that everyone who complains about a "hive mind" on one of these forums makes: you think that everyone has the same opinion, which is completely false. In reality, there's several different camps in each forum. Here on SN, there's at least two main camps: the leftists, and the libertarians.
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Monday April 10 2017, @11:07PM (1 child)
Here on SN, there's at least two main camps: the leftists, and the libertarians.
Don't forget the asshole camp. They are adequately represented.
(Score: 1) by butthurt on Tuesday April 11 2017, @10:05AM
Thanks for that. Sometimes I feel like I'm the only one.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday April 10 2017, @11:35PM
Did I use the words 'hive mind'? I used 'commentariat' because I was implicitly addressing that I was painting with a broad brush, as was clear from the context that I used it in (the hyperbole also helps). Reading comprehension is a vital skill.
I know there's a variety of posters here. The specific instance that I had in mind when I was expressing my opinion that rank propaganda from The Guardian or World Socialist Web Site are posted as submissions on this site on a regular basis and there's nothing but measured discussion about the fallacies of capitalism and longing for the coming socialist utopia. But someone sources a story from Breitbart and there's nothing but hundreds of comments of [autistic screeching] counter-signalling about the source of the article, and it's a bitch and a half to find discussion about the content. So my observation is not from assumption, but from statistical analysis. That you're reflexively upset about my observation shows that my over-broad characterization of commenters here hit too close to home for you.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday April 11 2017, @11:17PM
A more accurate categorization of the two main camps would be the slavers (liberals, conservatives, nanny-staters, "there aughtta be a law" folk, and to a large extent the libertarians), and the anti-slavers ("I exclusively own my body, and you exclusively own yours. Let's conduct ourselves accordingly").
(Score: 2) by Lagg on Monday April 10 2017, @08:34PM
Well I mean. You're doing a great job disproving the tinfoil hatters that think all Americans were brainwashed into a two party system from birth. :D
http://lagg.me [lagg.me] 🗿
(Score: 2) by linkdude64 on Monday April 10 2017, @09:01PM (8 children)
I was recently reflecting on this phenomena.
I do appreciate the fact that on SoylentNews, even the Left-of-Lenin do not call for banning of the Right-Of-Hitler, and likewise.
Sure, the "Party of Peace" Democrips will regularly call for the death and/or flagellation of the "Party of War" Rebloodicans, but they do not call for banning.
For all of our differences, I would say this is a healthy website, and Azuma Hazuki is just as intelligent and worthy of respect as The Mighty Buzzard. *dives for cover*
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Monday April 10 2017, @09:53PM (4 children)
Yep, I'm pretty fond of it myself.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday April 11 2017, @04:26AM (3 children)
Yeah, how great is it that all we ever do is rehash the same old shit over and over again? Never rising above the most basic arguments.
What a freakin paradise!!
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Tuesday April 11 2017, @09:58AM
Well, the software that runs the site is named Rehash after all.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by linkdude64 on Tuesday April 11 2017, @02:23PM (1 child)
You're right, and talking shit about SN is such a fresh perspective to see for once! Thank you for contributing!
I have a feeling you're from Reddit, Facebook, or the Other Site where arguments are "actually solved" by the mods banning the opposition.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday April 11 2017, @05:23PM
You're right, and talking shit about SN is such a fresh perspective to see for once! Thank you for contributing
You're right, and fellating SN is such a fresh perpsective to see for once! Thank you for contributing.
I have a feeling you're from Reddit, Facebook, or the Other Site where arguments are "actually solved" by the mods banning the opposition.
I have a low 2-digit SN uid that I don't use anymore. So blow me you carpet-bagging crybaby.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday April 11 2017, @03:13AM (2 children)
Hitler has been considered to be on the "right" because the popular alternative in the 1930s was literally communism.
He ran the national socialist party. The belief was that society was more important than the individual, and that this would be enforced by a strong government. By modern American standards, that is well to the left of mainstream democrats.
You can use "right of Hitler" to describe nearly all politics in the USA today. Hitler was even slightly left of Bernie Sanders.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday April 11 2017, @07:37AM (1 child)
The nationalist socialist party was so named because it was the result of the merger between the nationalist party and the socialist party. The nationalists ended up in power of the resulting party, but kept the name and thus the voters.
(Score: 2) by tangomargarine on Tuesday April 11 2017, @04:56PM
No. Try reading the first three paragraphs here. [wikipedia.org]
In fact, when those two parties merged (Freien Arbeiterausschuss für einen guten Frieden (Free Workers' Committee for a good Peace) and Politischer Arbeiterzirkel (Political Workers' Circle)), "socialist" wasn't in the resulting party name (Deutsche Arbeiterpartei, DAP (German Workers' Party)) at all. And it sounds like both of them were *anti-communist.* The only thing socialist about them was "economic socialism;" they were anti-Marxist.
From the outset, the DAP was opposed to non-nationalist political movements, especially on the left, including the Social Democratic Party of Germany (SPD) and the Communist Party of Germany (KPD). Members of the DAP saw themselves as fighting against "Bolshevism" and anyone considered a part of or aiding so-called "international Jewry".
Unless maybe you're getting confused with this:
However, while Hitler was on a fundraising trip to Berlin in June 1921, a mutiny broke out within the Nazi Party in Munich. Members of its executive committee, some of whom considered Hitler to be too overbearing, wanted to merge with the rival German Socialist Party (DSP).[58] Hitler returned to Munich on 11 July and angrily tendered his resignation. The committee members realised that his resignation would mean the end of the party.[59] Hitler announced he would rejoin on the condition that he would replace Drexler as party chairman, and that the party headquarters would remain in Munich.[60] The committee agreed, and he rejoined the party on 26 July as member 3680.
The Nazis changed their name at several points--once because they got banned after the Beer Hall Putsch--but Hitler was pretty pissed at the Weimar government, which was fairly socialist. Pretending to be socialist at all was just a ploy to get higher membership.
"Is that really true?" "I just spent the last hour telling you to think for yourself! Didn't you hear anything I said?"
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday April 10 2017, @08:55PM (10 children)
They complain, so Google bends over backwards to make them happy. That only encourages them. There is no point at which they will feel that things are OK.
It's not worth trying to appease toxic people.
(Score: 0, Disagree) by Anonymous Coward on Monday April 10 2017, @09:06PM (2 children)
"Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It would be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron's cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end for they do so with the approval of their own conscience."
Perhaps this situation isn't quite what C. S. Lewis was referring to. This tyranny is much better. This tyranny is exercised for the good of theoretical victims.
(Score: 2) by tangomargarine on Monday April 10 2017, @09:17PM (1 child)
Celine's Third Law: [wikipedia.org]
An honest politician is a national calamity.
"Is that really true?" "I just spent the last hour telling you to think for yourself! Didn't you hear anything I said?"
(Score: -1, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday April 11 2017, @01:35AM
Those books are so deep.
If you are a college freshman.
Are you gonna start quoting the church of the subgenius too?
(Score: 2) by bob_super on Monday April 10 2017, @09:15PM (6 children)
Now I'm really confused.
Trump's US Department of Labor is the SJW crowd?
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Monday April 10 2017, @09:55PM (2 children)
Until he gets around to replacing them, yep. In any case, this was started over a year ago.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by bob_super on Monday April 10 2017, @10:04PM (1 child)
It normally doesn't matter when an investigation started. The department boss can always shelve it at the last second if his new boss has other priorities.
One of the new guys at the top had to greenlight such a high-profile case.
And you can't call the new guys SJW unless you want me to have to buy a new ironometer.
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday April 11 2017, @12:30AM
One of the new guys at the top
There are zero Trump-nominated, Senate-confirmed "new guys at the top" of the Department of Labor; Edward Hugler, who's been with the department since at least 1998, is currently Acting Secretary of Labor.
Check this nominee tracker [washingtonpost.com] (from the Washington Post, if you care); Department of Labor is about halfway down. (This tracker only covers nominations to be confirmed by the Senate; I don't know what, if any, positions in the department are filled by direct appointment; if there are any such, Trump may have appointed them already, but they're certainly not "at the top".)
There are 14 positions listed; Trump's first nomination for Secretary of Labor (Andrew Puzder) was withdrawn in February, and his second nomination (Alexander Acosta) is waiting on the Senate. The 13 lower-ranking positions have no nominees at this time.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday April 10 2017, @10:03PM (2 children)
Trump is still trying to drain the swamp. He's facing unprecedented resistance to his nominations. Remember that it isn't just the top-level positions. He has many hundreds of spots left to fill.
Even if he went beyond that and replaced everybody, there is no way he can staff certain agencies without SJW infestation. Trying to find more than a handful of non-SJW for the Department of Labor is surely impossible. That would be like trying to hire pacifists for the US Marines.
That said, Google has been biased against Trump. Payback would be understandable. Also, maybe Ivanka is pushing the issue.
(Score: 2) by kaszz on Monday April 10 2017, @10:57PM
Fill with "maybe-SJW" and then keep the Fired! tool around to replace until it works?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday April 11 2017, @04:35PM
He's facing unprecedented resistance
I got unprecedented resistance from your mother's anus last night
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Monday April 10 2017, @10:50PM (1 child)
Is this actually discriminatory, and is it unethical?
To try to avoid the pitfalls of pre-judgment, consider the following...
House elves in the Harry Potter universe work for no money. If you ask them how much they want to be paid for their work, they say they don't want any. Wizards, on the other hand, do want money. If you ask them, they will say they want 10 Galleons an hour. ABC Scrolls employs both of them, and pays both of them exactly what they ask for: elves get 0 galleons, and Wizards 10 Galleons an hour. Is this a problem which needs to be fixed?
The argument for "no" is: "Both sides are getting paid exactly what they are asking for. They are presumably happy, barring some rabble-rousing Hermione who doesn't understand the situation and is trying to impose her own morality from her SPEW activist group. It can't be wrong to pay elves the 'nothing'... they are literally asking for it."
The argument for "yes" is: "Both sides are doing productive work, and they should be paid however much is equivalent for their work. Anything less is discriminatory."
I can see a compelling argument for both sides myself, and have no idea what the "right" answer is. Personally I would suggest that the "no" side has a stronger argument, but it's by no means obvious to me.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday April 10 2017, @11:49PM
The only wrong thing would be coercing people to accept either "yes" or "no".
This is a decision between a woman and her doctor—I mean boss! Between a woman and her boss.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday April 11 2017, @07:01AM (1 child)
https://www.fastcompany.com/3049676/a-womans-most-powerful-salary-negotiation-tool-silence [fastcompany.com]
https://www.monster.com/career-advice/article/three-negotiating-no-nos-for-women [monster.com]
In general women are more fearful and less (over)confident than men. That's why those "fail" videos of people doing crazy dangerous stuff have a gender imbalance. And that's why more guys get higher salaries in many cases and also why more guys are pioneers, CEOs, dictators, serial killers etc.
There are cases where women get higher salaries even though they are not as good. Take women's tennis for instance. The rank 200 men's tennis player can trash the top women's tennis players. But they earn far less.
Just waiting for some rank 200 man to claim he's a transgender woman (e.g. a tomboy lesbian trapped in a guy's body) and fight for "her" right to compete in women's tennis ;). It's truly retarded to legally regard someone as female just because they claim they are. To me if guys persist in trying to enter/compete in women's only areas they should get all their testicles removed (compulsorily by the State for repeat offenders). If they are still so attached to their testicles they aren't women. Real women would be happy to have them removed, especially for free.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday April 11 2017, @07:44AM
To me if guys persist in trying to enter/compete in women's only areas they should get all their testicles removed (compulsorily by the State for repeat offenders). If they are still so attached to their testicles they aren't women. Real women would be happy to have them removed, especially for free.
Androgen blockers and estrogen have the same results, and under international rules you are required to be on those for two years to compete on the women's only areas. After two years, the muscles are in the female range.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday April 11 2017, @06:13PM
Assume a pay gap exists. Google genuinely discovers they can hire women to do the exact same quality and performance of work as men for let's say 70% of the wage, as one interpretation of the "extreme" pay gap mentioned. I'm a Google finance executive. My entire worth is measured in no small part by my economic performance. I can hire a man for 100 units of pay or I can hire a woman for 70 units of pay. Hrmmm what am I going to do? What am I going to do? This is a tough one. No, it's not.
This [google.com] is Google's "diversity" page. Well lo and behold 69% of their employees are male.
Companies now a days obtain effective immunity from oversight and investigation through a mix of regulatory capture and "donations" which are just a euphemism for bribes. Consider the major action taken against Microsoft over their anti-competitive practices against Netscape. Compare that to what they are doing today with Windows 10 in regards to just about everything. The only thing that changed was that Microsoft started "donating" exponentially more than they were before. Google bet hard on Hillary winning the election, and lost. They would have reaped the rewards and instead now they get to pay the price. As the article mentions the labor department’s lawyers have already asked the court to cancel all of the company’s federal contracts and block any future business with the government if it continues to refuse to comply with the audit.
This has little to nothing to do with gender. Google hires on merit and promotions are sought out by employees in a regular and formal process, instead of being arbitrarily cronyistically granted. If men were more ambitious and/or self confident then that might result in a disproportionate result but that goes against the narrative. Remember, men and women are absolutely and completely identical. Genetics be damned, the only difference is in social bias and systemic discrimination. Women can be just as ambitious as men. Great then, we have no problem with the system!