
What happens when you talk about salaries at Google - awjr
http://www.wired.com/2015/07/happens-talk-salaries-google/?mbid=social_twitter
======
sctb
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9906107](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9906107)

~~~
carrotleads
yeah was searching for that as well.. this thread doesn't appear in the HN
list and even search didn't throw it up..

Wonder if there is a special type of Shadow banning submissions on HN

------
chasing
This is not journalism. Do not treat it as such.

Molly McHugh and Wired need to reach out to this woman and ask a few
questions. They need to reach out to Google and ask a few questions.

Otherwise, this information is just a shade better than useless. There's a lot
of detail missing in these tweets. There's a lot of handwaving where the
audience is essentially invited to fill in the blanks with whatever
stereotypes -- good or bad -- they feel like.

It irritates me immensely that this story is now out there and getting to be a
Big Deal -- and there's no actual journalism to attempt to get to the bottom
of it. How time consuming could it possibly be to send a few e-mails, hop on
the phone, or go dig up someone you know who works at Google and might shed
some light on this?

Maybe Erica Joy is right. Maybe there's a huge problem at Google regarding
sharing salaries. Maybe something illegal or, at least, immoral/hypocritical
is going on. Or maybe Erica Joy is misunderstanding something about how Google
works. About how peer bonuses work, for example. Or maybe some combination of
both.

But unless we want to go dig up that information on our own, we just don't
know.

Good job, Wired.

~~~
learnstats2
This comment is derailing. The precise definition of journalism is totally
irrelevant.

Erica Joy has shared an important story that we should listen to.

~~~
hockley
How'd that work out for Rolling Stone? When you report without fact-checking
it's a disservice to readers, and sometimes, the people's voices you are
trying to amplify.

------
deadmik3
Was stringing together a couple dozen tweets really the best format to share a
story like this?

There is a lot that's left out. Once she vaguely mentions that another
employee who was "involved" was still getting all of his peer bonuses (which
may or may not have been PB's for his "involvement", we don't know), the whole
thing just crumbled into a victim story for me. OF COURSE the MALE coworker
can do WHATEVER HE WANTS, as long as we don't actually have any details about
it.

Also, generally shit will hit the fan if you tell anyone to fuck off,
especially if they're your manager. Again, we don't know that she told her
manager to fuck off for being racist (??) because this is a terrible story
told in a shitty format. But it's implied. Just like everything else in this
"article".

tl;dr she got exactly what you would expect when you're intentionally stirring
shit up at any company. I'm not sure what she expected.

~~~
mhluongo
> tl;dr she got exactly what you would expect when you're intentionally
> stirring shit up at any company. I'm not sure what she expected.

What? Sharing salary information is a protected employee activity, and
retaliation is illegal.. so maybe she expected there wouldn't be retaliation?

~~~
malchow
"retaliation is illegal"

I'm not sure what world you think we inhabit. Are we humanoid automatons? The
whole welter of human emotion more or less always outweighs a programmatic
injunction like "retaliation is illegal."

Companies are still people working together. They'll probably never be
anything but people working together. It does not matter how protected the
activity allegedly is; a giant embarrassment campaign run against your
company, especially if in pursuit of a particularly feeble branch on the tree
of political correctness, means you're out. Or, at least, things won't be
pleasant for you. Because your coworkers, above and below, don't like what
you've done to their company. One can't write a law preventing that.

~~~
balabaster
Oh, one _can_ write a law preventing that, but what happens when you write
laws to curb human emotion? Very little. Human nature takes generations to
alter their behaviour - even with laws making that behaviour illegal. It sucks
that we can't be less judgmental, more accepting and more adaptable to the
wants of others, but that's the way we are: Flawed. Until we can be more
tolerant and accepting of one anothers needs and less bound by our own egos,
we will be doomed to repeat this behaviour until we destroy ourselves.

~~~
pjc50
_what happens when you write laws to curb human emotion_

We call this "civilisation".

~~~
balabaster
Now if only we _were_ as civilized as we'd like to be. It takes many years for
these values to become the norm. We make great steps every year and will
continue to do so.

------
sergiotapia
Other side of the story:
[https://www.reddit.com/r/technology/comments/3e05wg/what_hap...](https://www.reddit.com/r/technology/comments/3e05wg/what_happens_when_you_talk_about_salaries_at/ctap9sx)

Either way both are completely unverifiable. Take both with a huge fistful of
salt until both parties are interviewed and quoted and research is done into
what happened.

~~~
chockablock
One 'side' is a non-anonymous first-person account from one of the major
parties in the described event.

The other 'side' is a post from Redditor 'dickbutt_md', who claims to have
called up "a friend" who works at Google. In dickbutt's account, the friend
claims not to know Joy personally, and not to have been involved in the
events, but manages to describe Joy as "passive aggressive" and "not classy",
and closes by saying "Google is fucking awesome and anyone who says otherwise
is talking out their ass."

I kind of wish this were not the top-voted comment on an HN thread about pay
equity.

~~~
cpncrunch
Here is an (apparently) non-anonymous comment from HN which seems to be saying
the same thing:

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9908030](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9908030)

~~~
acdha
There are a few things in common but that account is far more professional –
note the lack of personal disparagement directed at her and the direct
acknowledgement that they had significant problems in parts of the company.

Explaining how salary disparities might have happened is very different from
saying she's making it up or calling them a rabble-rouser.

~~~
cpncrunch
Erica is strongly implying that she was discriminated against either because
of her colour or her sex, but these reports seem to suggest that there were
other reasons for her PB rejection and the salary disparities, and therefore
her entire spiel is (probably) invalid.

Some disparagement seems reasonable, unless she has some more evidence to back
up her claims of discrimination.

~~~
acdha
Or, as many others have pointed out, that her experience with her immediate
management and group can be true without being representative of the entire
company.

Note that, unlike the unverifiable hecklers, deelowe did not claim that her
experience was invalid or that the numbers in the spreadsheet were inaccurate
but instead discussed the question of sampling bias or simply the sample size
being small enough to be skewed by other known factors.

~~~
cpncrunch
As I pointed out in my comment, I'm talking about the accusations of
racism/sexism. In particular the accusations of racism regarding her peer
bonuses, telling the "known racist" to "fuck off", etc. _That_ seems to be
completely unsubstantiated/refuted.

It's fair enough being upset about your peer bonuses being rejected. What is
_not_ okay is to just to some invalid conclusion about racism and then slander
your company in public.

------
bronxcoder
I hate that wage disparity is being heralded as a gender issue. It's really a
negotiating problem. My coworker and I were hired together, same position,
same experience, and offered the same salary. When I was offered the position,
I asked for $15,000 more and they gave it to me. My coworker didn't ask for
more and is therefore now making $15,000 less than me. After six months, I
asked for a raise of $5,000. He never asked for a raise. So now he makes
$20,000 less than me.

~~~
Anderkent
Most people also agree that in ideal circumstances you wouldn't have to
negotiate your wages (because you're effectively being rewarded for your
negotiating skill, which is probably completely irrelevant to your actual
productivity and value).

~~~
bronxcoder
I would agree but I think there is something about a person who believes in
themselves enough to negotiate that can be a differentiator. For instance, my
coworker is a total slacker, comes in late and leaves early. I come in early
and leave late and take on extra work. Someone who is determined enough to
feel they are worth more money will probably statistically work harder. I know
it isn't the same for all people, but I would bet that the majority of people
who ask for more money work harder.

~~~
pjc50
It's not unusual to find female employees who are doing extra work because
they don't have the confidence to deflect it or seize credit, _and_ who are
comparably underpaid.

Work hardness (how do you measure this, anyway?) and salary are weakly
correlated above the minimum in most work places.

~~~
exstudent2
That's an extreme generalization that's sexist against males and females.
There are plenty of women with confidence and negotiation prowess and men that
lack them.

------
dataker
>"Don't you know what could happen?"

>Nothing. It's illegal to retaliate against employees for sharing salaries.

This answer in fantastic and I wish more technical people learned with this.

As a programmer, some managers assume(often rightly so) that you have no clue
about laws, finance and business in general.

~~~
deadmik3
I think this shows how selfish her goals really were. As if her manager asking
"Don't you know what could happen?" implied that bad things could happen to
only _her_. Why would she assume they were saying _she_ would be retaliated
against (or that anyone would be retaliated against)? What about the other 5%
of the company this affected?

~~~
angelbob
Retaliation is illegal against them, too.

~~~
deadmik3
The point is the manager might not have even been implying _any_ retaliation.
Can you think of other possible meanings behind the manager's question?

~~~
vehementi
Yeah I didn't even at first take it to mean "the company can retaliate". I
assumed the manager was referring to unrest & animosity at people undeservedly
making more money than others.

~~~
eropple
Which is still not the employee's problem, and so bringing it up is, to me,
very much a threat.

~~~
deadmik3
As an employee you should _kind of_ care about the company's problems,
especially if they're ones that _you_ caused. It doesn't read like a threat to
me as much as it's a "Do you even realize the internal repercussions of
everyone discussing their salaries?"

They're just asking for insight into why this could be a problem (think 3rd
grade, "Do you know why this is wrong?") and she shoots back aggressively. I
think her inability to produce any sort of thought besides oppression shows
that she probably isn't able to handle issues like this.

~~~
eropple
Those repercussions are irrelevant in their entirety because it is both legal
and right to discuss compensation. There's nothing for her to consider as
wrong and inconveniencing an employer by exercising _completely and utterly
protected rights_ is not, in any way or by any stretch of the word, her
problem. The company may have a problem with openness and truthfulness, but
it's not hers, and to lay it at her feet speaks volumes of you but not of her.

(edit: politeness)

~~~
deadmik3
I don't think she's an SJW and putting quotes around it doesn't mean I ever
said that (I didn't). I just think she's a shitty employee.

Whether or not it's legal for her to discuss those things, it's also legal for
her employer to be upset that she's making the work environment more difficult
for others.

The problem with these noble issues is that there's a view that you can do no
wrong as long as you're fighting for what's right. She clearly sees herself as
some Snowdenesque whistle-blower, and she's surprised that it's cold in
Russia.

~~~
eropple
_> it's also legal for her employer to be upset that she's making the work
environment more difficult for others_

I guess I'm not done, because I am compelled to point out that this is
completely false. That's the entire point of all of the legality around the
protection of these discussions under United States law: that, no, your
employer cannot be "upset" at you for choosing to exercise that right.

~~~
deadmik3
But they didn't actually do anything to her! What did they do? Please, I am
clearly missing it.

Yes they can absolutely be unhappy that their employees are causing a problem,
that's why they tried to discuss it with her. But they didn't do anything to
her for it.

~~~
eropple
An employer is the power-holder in almost any employer/employee relationship.
And so even the "discussion" exists to have a chilling effect upon that
worker. The act of having that uncomfortable and fraught discussion is _in
itself_ a threat. You have those "discussions" to get a worker to stop
exercising their rights. There's no other reason to have it.

When your employee does something that is entirely legal and protected, you
don't have a "discussion" with them. You nod, say "OK", and you do absolutely
nothing else, because nothing you do in response to it, as it pertains to that
employee, can be anything other than hostile--and hostility of _your_
direction. Not the employee's, not now and not ever.

~~~
deadmik3
First off, all we know is that it was a question "Do you know what could
happen?", not some scary "discussion". Such a chilling question to ask
someone, so intimidate, very trigger.

It's good to know that my employer can never question anything I do legally
without being hostile, though.

~~~
eropple
That's an interesting misreading of what I said. Let's try again: your
employer had best not even give the appearance of questioning _legally
protected actions_. Is that straightforward enough? Does that make sense?

But I cannot envision a situation where the question "do you realize what
could happen?" is not implicitly suggesting that the realization to be made is
one of company harm--and thus, yes, _threatening_.

------
amelius
Google is a company that wants to have access to all the information in the
world.

But if somebody rightfully publishes some information that is sensitive to
Google, look what happens...

~~~
bostonpete
In the reddit comment thread for this u/dickbutt_md had a lengthy comment that
seemed to call into question some of the details of this story. His facts
weren't first hand, but then again, sometimes a little distance can help with
objectivity. In any event, I tend to take comments from possibly-disgruntled
former employees with a pinch of salt.

~~~
eropple
On one hand, we have a primary source putting her name on the line, publicly,
with a story about her personal experiences. On the other, you have
"dickbutt_md" talking about his-friend-at-Google/his-uncle-at-Nintendo and how
the primary source that the secondary source doesn't know personally is "a
passive aggressive rabble rouser."

And we have HN posters reposting it like it means something.

I think we just hit the peak of this "do anything to discredit a woman who has
a beef with a tech company" thing.

~~~
WorldWideWayne
Is this one of those "high information", intelligent comments? Seems like it
amounts to little more than gossip. I'm also wondering if you could point me
to what you think your best comment is? Thanks.

------
tempodox
The article format is completely busted by Twitter's display rules and made
unreadable. In this case, formatting the text in a readable way would probably
get you sued. Those tweets belong to Twitter now and are good for nothing else
but ferrying ads. I won't have my time wasted by trying to read that crap.

~~~
imglorp
Why do people insist on using that medium for blogging?

It would be better to tweet, "Guys, I updated my blog with a story about this
thing (link)".

~~~
cmdrfred
I had no idea this was a trend. How could anyone ever think this is a good
idea? You'd think the editors at wired would be able to copy and paste, surely
that's easier than embedding 45 tweets.

~~~
tempodox
While this is technically true, you also need to adhere to Twitter's TOS if
you're going to use their product.

~~~
Robin_Message
Or Wired could do some actual _journalism_ and, I don't know, interview the
original poster plus ask her ex-boss and Google for comments plus try and
track down the mysterious other man?

------
bakhy
i hope things like this serve as a wake up call to all young talents willing
to sacrifice their lives for these companies, enamored with some idealized
visions of what they are and do.

a company is a company. an agent for making money, first and foremost. any
positive change they bring is a side-effect, and due to their ever greater
power they must constantly be policed, at least by releasing unpleasant
information like this.

~~~
staticelf
And in my opinion as a young talent, Google is highly overrated when it comes
to creating good software. Sure they have some hits, but a lot of it also is
kind of bad.

To be regarded as the best of the best, I think they make pretty shitty
software.

~~~
abrahamepton
I feel similarly about Facebook. I feel it with some justification, but I'm
probably wrong. To do what they do at the scale they do it, for it to even
work let alone work pretty much perfectly, pretty much all the time for pretty
much everyone is a goddamn miracle. But there are so many little things about
FB software (mostly the UI/UX) that annoy the shit out of me, so I get grumpy
and think their software sucks.

Having worked at Google, I think it's worth saying, their software is fucking
astonishingly amazing. The magic tricks that go into the simplest things are
mindboggling, and what's been built behind the scenes to enable it all is
pretty incredible.

Also, um, a lot of their software is far from shitty: Gmail, search,
docs+spreadsheets, new photos, youtube to name a few. If you think any one of
those are "pretty shitty", well...I dunno what to tell you.

~~~
veidr
Here's my list of things that you mentioned which aren't shitty:

    
    
        search

~~~
pennaMan
Can you name any other huge scale user facing software product that isn't
shitty by your standards?

------
srj
Managers evidently aren't supposed to approve more than one peer bonus for the
same single act. I work at Google and hadn't heard of that policy before (then
again, I'm not a manager) but it came up in an earlier thread.

------
aswdeffr
Googler here on a throwaway. I personally know Erica and followed her career.
it is quite frankly bizarre to see her biting back against Google given the
opportunities she was given.

Erica was a tech stop employee, which is Google's help desk. in terms of
technical ability, hiring standards for tech stop are lower than for SRE,
where she ended up. every non-erica tech stopper, including me, who wants to
transfer into the technical side of the org is required to pass a full suite
of interviews, same as an outside candidate. it would be obvious from
examining her submit history that Erica is not really meeting this bar. and
yet a door was opened into SRE somehow.

she stayed a few months in SRE, underperformed, and spent a lot of time
ranting on internal platforms. again, this is verifiable because commits at
Google are public. she chose to join a team of about 50% women working under a
female director, so I have a hard time believing discrimination is the major
factor here. now she is gone and believes she was wronged and is telling
everyone so. the similarities to michaelochurch are strong.

~~~
omouse
> _she stayed a few months in SRE, underperformed_

If that's the case it looks like she wasn't aware of it; especially if you're
suggesting a door was opened for her maybe there's some more transparency
that's needed in the process.

> _the similarities to michaelochurch are strong._

IIRC he _was_ wronged and he got an apology for it:
[https://michaelochurch.wordpress.com/2013/07/03/my-name-
is-c...](https://michaelochurch.wordpress.com/2013/07/03/my-name-is-cleared/)

Aside from Erica and her situation do you feel the salary sharing was a good
thing? Did it negatively impact Google?

~~~
aswdeffr
Nobody really believes michaelochurch received an apology from upper
management. the lawsuit potential alone means that even if there was such an
apology it would never be in email. he really actually seems to be crazy.

I personally really appreciated the spreadsheet because I am anti-capitalist,
but I find Erica's version of the facts to be distorted in a self-serving way.
I find it hard to believe this would meaningfully impact her career.

------
Anderkent
So here's a devils advocacy for not having transparency around money:

On average everyone thinks they're above average

([https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Illusory_superiority#Reference...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Illusory_superiority#References))

Two people of equal value and skill will both think they're better than the
other person, and thus deserve higher compensation. How do you reconcile that
with salary transparency? Seems like you'll be making more people unhappy.

Would wages turn into status goods, where both of those people continuously
ask for raises because in their view they're underpaid, and eventually get
denied, which will probably offend them and cause them to leave?

Secondly, does this actually solve any problems that simple backchannels
between employees don't? People already talk about salary at lunch breaks or
over coffee; the advantage is that those are private conversations between
friends, rather than your salary being broadcasted to everyone for them to
judge. What problem does this actually solve?

~~~
dalke
You may want to ground your advocacy in real-world data. This is a widely
discussed topic. You might want to start with
[http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2011/07/the-
case...](http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2011/07/the-case-for-
making-wages-public-better-pay-better-workers/242238/) .

The salaries of public sector workers are public, as are the CEO and other
parts of upper management in public companies. Everyone's salary is some
countries are available to the public.

Quoting from that Atlantic article:

> The worse the individuals' pay was relative to the median, the worse their
> satisfaction. Those at or above the median, however, experienced no change
> in job satisfaction or job search intention.

> These economists conclude that pay transparency just makes workers who are
> on the low-end of the pay scale feel worse about their jobs, so it
> accomplishes little. Linda Barrington notes, however, that this contention
> misses a benefit of being unsatisfied: the likelihood of moving on .... to
> another job, which would match that improved performance with better pay

Regarding the second, backchannels, again we can look to real-world examples
to show how difficult or delayed those backchannels might be. Consider Lilly
Ledbetter, who was hired as a supervisor in 1979. It wasn't until (quoting
from
[http://content.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,1874954,0...](http://content.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,1874954,00.html)
)

> Shortly before she was due to retire in 1998, an anonymous co-worker slipped
> a note into her mailbox at work comparing her pay against that of three
> other male counterparts. Ledbetter was making $3,727 per month, while men
> doing the same job were paid $4,286 to $5,236 per month.

Quoting now from [http://www.nwlc.org/resource/lilly-ledbetter-fair-pay-
act-0](http://www.nwlc.org/resource/lilly-ledbetter-fair-pay-act-0) (emphasis
mine):

> Her co-workers bragged about their overtime pay, but _Goodyear did not allow
> its employees to discuss their pay_

She filed an EEOC complaint, which the Supreme Court said wasn't allowed under
the law because it the discriminatory acts of the past decades were older than
the statutory 180 days for filing an EEOC complaint. The result was the Lilly
Ledbetter Fair Pay Act of 2009, which resets the clock after each paycheck
made from the result of a discriminatory act.

Here's another article, [http://www.financialsamurai.com/never-tell-anyone-
how-much-m...](http://www.financialsamurai.com/never-tell-anyone-how-much-
money-you-make/) , which says, basically, never tell anyone else your salary.

Since it's easy to show existing cases where people _don 't_ talk about their
salaries though back channels, your belief that "people already talk about
salary" may be true for some, but surely is not universally true.

Plus, how many of those people are not telling the full truth?

------
littletimmy
It is important that things like this come out into the open.

When the typical doe-eyed college senior steps into the real world and is
tempted to drink Eric Schmidt's kool-aid about changing the world (and how the
honor of working at Google offsets the lower wage), such disclosures will help
him understand that Google is just another money-making corporation. No more,
no less.

~~~
seattle_spring
Can you elaborate on what you mean by "offsetting the lower wage?" Isn't
Google pretty well known as being one of the top paying tech companies?

------
fridek
Not that it matters and it was already said elsewhere, but peer bonus can be
awarded only once for one thing. And it makes sense in a 50k+ company, where
some social interaction happens and a single person can become peer-bonus-
celebrity easily. It's not a good thing to incentivize :) Also if I were a
manager sifting through some kind of peer bonus app I'd too be tempted to mark
all as rejected after a while.

There was a book recently, Work rules! by Laszlo Bock who happens to be a head
of people operations. He describes exactly those inequality patterns. It's
nothing unusual, some of it is accepted (some people earn more for their
higher value) and some not (woman not asking for a raise so easily).
Seriously, just go and read a book, not some stream of contextless tweets
gathered together.

~~~
eitally
I just finished Work Rules! and was going to say the same thing. There's a
whole chapter in there explaining why it's smart _not_ to pay everyone exactly
the same.

------
mdesq
These big tech companies only love "transparency" when it's other people's
data they want to look through.

------
throwaway345r
Collecting evidence is the right way to approach situations like this.
However, when the position is so politically entrenched, extra care _must_ be
taken so that opponents cannot dismiss the data due to poor collection
practices.

Unfortunately, that care was not taken in this case, and of course, you see
opponents dismissing the data. The worst part is that this effort may actually
prevent proper data collection in the future: "remember what happened last
time we did that?"

------
emirozer
Wouldn't it be better to __try__ to create a global movement within the
industry for employees to feed accurate data to glassdoor?

Sidenote: Most of the people around here knows glassdoor but i have worked
with a lot of people who never heard of it..

------
thesch
a thing bothered me yesterday and it's still bothering me today and so now i
want to tell a story.

One Sunday, some former coworkers & I were bored, talking about salaries on
the internal social network instance. A spreadsheet was created. we put our
salaries in the sheet, realized that it was created on a public to the world
spreadsheet, so I copied it to internal. I then put a form on it and posted
the link to the form and the spreadsheet on my internal social network
account.

It took off like wildfire.

It got reshared all over the place. People started adding pivot tables that
did spreadsheet magic that highlighted not great things re: pay. I did some
general housekeeping stuff to the sheet (normalizing the gender field where it
could be, exchange rate stuff, that sort of thing).

More reshares.

More people adding pay.

It became a thing.

I was invited to talk to my manager on Mon or Tues. Higher up people weren't
happy. She wasn't happy. Why did I do it? "Don't you know what could happen?"
Nothing. It's illegal to retaliate against employees for sharing salaries.
"Wellll....".

Meeting ended.

Sheet kept going.

People were thanking me for it. They were also sending me peer bonuses. here's
how peer bonuses work @ former co:

If you did something good, someone peer bonuses you, you get $150 net in your
next paycheck. An important thing I learned during that time: peer bonuses are
rewarded at managers discretion. My manager was rejecting all of them. Wasn't
sure if this would be good for the company. Wanted to see what the outcome
was. Mind you once a PB is rejected, that can't be undone.

Meanwhile, one of the other people involved, a white dude (good friend I won't
name, he can name himself if he wants), was also getting PBs. His weren't
getting rejected. I told him mine were. He was pissed. Wanted to tell everyone
what was happening. I declined. A smattering of people knew what was going on.
Backchannels being what they are at former co. (lol IRC #yallknowwhoyouare),
it got around. Rejecting PBs was so unheard of, ppl didn't know it was
possible. There was outrage when they found out. Shock that I wasn't talking
abt it. Meanwhile, spreadsheet still going, getting spread around, pointed
questions being thrown at mgmt about sharing salary ranges (hahah no). Most
people agreed that it was A Good Thing. PBs kept rolling in. Rejections kept
rolling out. One PB eventually got approved. Way after everything died down.
Because the person worded it in a way that was vary vague. Any that were
outright about the spreadsheet got rejected. 7 total in the end I think?

Higher ups still pissed. Some I used to support as an exec tech would
pointedly not interact w/ me anymore. ¯_(ツ)_/¯ Before I left, about 5% of
former co. had shared their salary on that sheet. People asked for & got
equitable pay based on data in the sheet. The world didn't end. Everything
didn't go up in flames because salaries got shared. But shit got better for
some people.

I explicitly gave ownership of the sheet to someone else before I left so it
couldn't be taken over by mgmt when I was gone (can happen).

I am thinking of this because of everyone celebrating the fact that Google put
Ida B. Wells in the doodle yesterday. Ida B. Wells was great. She did stuff to
affect change of such a magnitude that if I'm half the woman she was, I'm
doing pretty good. I don't claim to come close, but from time to time, I do
stuff that will make things better for people at the expense of the
establishment. I'm a pretty big believer in justice and fairness and will
fight for both if necessary. Fighting for justice & fairness INSIDE Google
doesn't go over well. Salary sharing is only 1 example. Blogger porn. Real
names. Many others. Shit WILL hit the fan if you tell a racist (a well
documented racist) to go fuck themselves though. In defense of the racist,
obvi. So sure. Rah rah, Google did an Ida B. Wells doodle. Guaranteed that if
Ida Wells were alive & working at Google today, there'd be many private
calendar meetings focused on "her future" there.

tl;dr the sharing of one doodle does not a bastion of support for justice and
civil disobedience make.

~~~
dostick
Rich people problems! Why is this a thing and why on front page?

~~~
sokoloff
Because it's of interest to many hackers. Your personal disinterest is noted.

------
netrus
Sooo ... it would be great to get a look on that sheet ;)

~~~
jonlucc
There are already public versions such as glassdoor.com

------
FilterSweep
Most employees at large companies are just cogs in a machine. At Google, they
are lab rats.

------
okamiueru
Isn't the reason why Erica Joy no longer works at google highly relevant? If
she did this during a contract termination notice period requested by google,
the reason for the termination might have something to do with whomever had
any say in denying the peer bonuses. Which seems to be the whole point of the
article, as the rest is pure speculation.

She did however mention that one bonus passed through, arguing it was too
vague to be given because of the spread sheet. Hm.

------
marknutter
She shouldn't have been reprimanded for creating the spreadsheet. Upper
management is always terrified of information they don't control.

------
lifeisstillgood
I am struggling with the response to this. My questions are

1\. Does the spreadsheet really cover 5% or so of google employees? If so it
has pretty decent statistical validity despite selection bias etc?

2\. Is the spreadsheet accurate, or at least will the reporting differences
cancel out?

3\. Assuming the above two are correct, and it seems fair to say yes, then
whether she used Twitter, or is grinding an ace is totally irrelevant - Google
has a fair pay problem, and really needs to deal with it.

On a personal note, a company is _not_ a market. Class's theory of the firm
says it eschews market discipline to achieve more efficient allocation of hard
to judge resources. and as such I do not believe that saying "negotiate
better" is a valid option for a company of this size. It's bad for everyone
but the good negotiators.

------
jaawn
It is unfortunate that a large amount of the discussion is being distracted by
the stringing-together-tweets thing. Yes, it was lame to do that, but isn't it
more worthwhile to talk about the content?

I think most of us probably work at a company that discourages salary
transparency (most people do in general). I think we could have a more
valuable discussion about how our experiences compare/contrast to the content
of the tweets, and save the "omg a bunch of tweets _are not_ an article!"
comments for when someone writes a blog post about _that_ and shares it on HN.

------
vinceyuan
It's very common that people with similar skills have different salary,
especially in a big company.

Big companies have the rules in salary increase rate for the current
employees, but are willing to pay more to hire new employees from other
companies.

For example, A's salary is $5000 and yearly increase rate is 5%. Two years
later, A's classmate B is hired. B's salary is $6000. A's salary is $5512.5.

Similar thing happened to me. Luckily I got an exceptional salary increase
years later. But eventually I left that company after 6-year service.

------
deskamess
For some reason I was under the impression the spreadsheet was set up to
detect gender/ethnicity based inequality in salaries. Not sure where I got
that impression as the tweets do not mention it explicitly other than
suggesting that some people asked and got increases.

At the end of the day, this is what I am curious about - was there inequality
in pay, and if so, what was the difference.

~~~
danielweber
The use of the sheet was orthogonal to discovering her peer bonuses weren't
being approved.

~~~
deskamess
True... but the peer bonus aspect seems to have overtaken, for me, a more
interesting metric (pay inequality amount from spreadsheet data).

------
something123
The problem I see sharing salaries is that people tend to overestimate how
good they are. So inevitably everyone will have salary envy and no one will be
happy.

It also would make explicit who is most valuable to the company.. which can be
dangerous

~~~
skarap
> The problem I see sharing salaries is that people tend to overestimate how
> good they are.

Absolutely. Gather 10 people from a company in a single room and I really
doubt they will be able to agree on it. Especially when it's not even about
how good they are, but how much value they provide. I have seen this issue in
a team of 3 people I managed, it's hard to imagine what it will look like with
100+ people.

------
danielweber
> Salary sharing is only 1 example. Blogger porn. Real names. Many others.

I can't tell from context whether she was supporting or stopping "blogger
porn" and/or "real names."

~~~
cbr
"blogger porn" and "real names" refer to two cases where Google made an
unpopular decision internally and then later reversed itself:
[https://plus.google.com/+googleplus/posts/V5XkYQYYJqy](https://plus.google.com/+googleplus/posts/V5XkYQYYJqy)
[https://productforums.google.com/forum/m/#%21category-
topic/...](https://productforums.google.com/forum/m/#%21category-
topic/blogger/jAep2mLabQY)

I take "fighting for justice & fairness" to indicate that she approved of the
reversals.

------
fleitz
Where is the data? Or at least a summation of it? What was the discrepancy?
Was it adjusted for experience?

------
Aoyagi
You've just given their analytics bunch of traffic from HN which looks like it
came from Twitter. :P

------
seqizz
Don't be evil (with exceptions).

~~~
x5n1
Be evil, pretend not to be. Google is evil and knows everything about
everybody and shares it with various orgs including three letter orgs. The
only thing positive about Google is the fact that it releases a lot of code
out there for people to use. Other than that, Google is a corporate overlord.

------
icedchai
This is nice and all, but where is a link to the actual spreadsheet?

------
dudul
That may be shallow, but I can't take her seriously because of the medium she
picked to convey her story.

This is unreadable.

------
dharma1
link to the spreadsheet?

------
yc1010
Can someone please tl.dr this

First we had articles spread over dozens of pages for the laugh, now we have
articles split into 160char segments, grrrrrr

~~~
corin_
She created an internal spreadsheet allowing Googlers to add their salary
information.

Lots of people helped tweak the sheet adding data visualizations, comparisons,
etc.

Google management told her they didn't like it, she pointed out that you can't
be fired for sharing salary information.

Lots of colleagues were giving her "peer bonuses" for setting this up, but her
manager kept blocking them, something which is apparently unheard of to the
point that most people didn't know they could be blocked.

By the time she left, 5% of staff were apparently using the sheet.

Even more TLDR: Nothing particularly happened except that Google showed they
dislike colleagues talking about salaries.

~~~
Kiro
What's a peer bonus?

~~~
tempVariable
I've read that you can award a $150 bonus to another colleague, at which point
a manager can approve or block the award. The second part,- manager blocking
her from getting the bonus is what sparked the additional controversy.

edit: sibling comment says $100, could be either or.

------
paulhauggis
This is exactly what happens: jealousy and people thinking that they somehow
deserve the money more than the person making more...blaming of on "sexism"

------
nicboobees
Nothing good comes from knowing other peoples salary. Only jealousy,
resentment, unhappiness, and greed.

~~~
eropple
Or an actual understanding of market position and--in the case of less
privileged folks--a way to smoke out systemic bias.

You know--things that any worker should want to know.

~~~
nicboobees
Maybe it's different here. In the UK it's considered vulgar to discuss money
or how much you earn.

~~~
eropple
Have you paused to consider who would benefit from instilling that idea in
you? Because it's not you who benefits.

~~~
nicboobees
It certainly is me who benefits.

In 2 previous jobs, I found out what others at the company were making. OK,
they were managers, but still, it just made me pissed off. It didn't make me
happy by any means.

As others note, people tend to generally think they're above average. Can you
not see that exploding their delusion might not be such a great idea? Some of
them have to be below average. A team who doesn't share salary info, can all
be happy that they're all above average. If they start sharing salary, half
will be below average and probably pretty pissed off.

The people who benefit, are people who are generally happy as they are. Would
you like to know how much money your neighbours have? Why should it matter?

------
zyb09
To be honest, what exactly did she want to accomplish with this? Where I live
people are very hesitant of sharing their salary and doing something like this
would be considered very rude. All it can possibly lead to is drama about
salaries. Drama about why some people getting payed more then others. Should
Google now start paying each and everyone exactly the same until everyone is
happy? No of course not, it's no secret companies have different salaries for
different employees. What matters is that YOU feel ok with what you're getting
payed, not what others are earning.

~~~
tashoecraft
The reason people are very hesitant about sharing their salary is because we
have constructed a culture where it is taboo to share what you make. That we
have these ideals about how terrible things could be if you knew what others
were making in comparison to you.

Her manager talked to her saying "Don't you know what could happen?". Well
management couldn't fire her for that, but could make her work life less then
ideal. Possibly holding back bonuses out of spite? Worse job assignments?

The huge job salary scandal that Google was a part of kinda shows hows they
can't be trusted to be honest about salaries and supportive of their workers.

You feeling ok with what you are getting paid is not what matters. What
matters is getting fair market value for your worth. Many people make less
then what they are worth because they either don't know how much they are
worth, or are even too afraid to argue for what they feel they are worth.
Companies exploit this and use salary negotiations as a way to hire employees
for the absolute least amount possible.

We applaud companies for making record breaking profits, but we don’t applaud
them for decreasing their profits a bit in favor of increasing all their
employees spending power.

------
murbard2
What happens is that your spreadsheet won't be properly adjusted for all
factors, people will look for bias, claim discrimination, and get a big bully
to fine your company (and look caring and compassionate while doing it)

~~~
jaawn
If a manager and company have any justification for pay differences that are
not due to protected classes, then they have nothing to fear. If they do pay
people differently because of protected classes, they may run into trouble,
but I think that's okay.

If most companies were transparent, employees would be a lot more
knowledgeable about what leads to more pay. I think we would see more
negotiation and engagement and healthier conversations about money. People
would be upset at first, but once we start collectively understanding the
legitimate reasons for pay discrepancies, and we eliminate the illegitimate
ones, I think most people would be happier.

~~~
murbard2
Of course they have nothing to fear, because these prosecutions never serve a
political agenda, the judicial system has displayed a commitment to integrity,
people don't assume the accused are automatically guilty, and trials are so
cost efficient that people only settle when they've done something wrong.

~~~
jaawn
Even political agendas and sensationalist trials need some leg to stand on to
be successful. If you hire honestly and set pay honestly and fairly, with
recorded justifications, it is unlikely that your company would suffer any
negative repercussions of pay transparency. However, this doesn't mean "
_absolutely no company anywhere_ will run into legal trouble due to this"

There are always exceptions, but they are just that: exceptions. The existence
of an exception or outlier does not disprove what generally holds true for
everyone else.

~~~
murbard2
No, they really don't. I've seen it happen many times in finance, baseless
accusations extracting large fines because settling is almost always cheaper
than fighting in court. In something like hiring policies which can be
discretionary, the problem is 10 times worse.

~~~
jaawn
If that is the case, is that the fault of hiring and pay transparency, or the
justice system?

------
dbg31415
So... here's A problem with this.

Are you verifying that the users are actually who they say they are when they
share salaries? What if I were to go into the form and say that I was you, and
that you made a billion dollars more than everyone else. Would that cause
drama?

This just seems like a horrible idea. Feelings will be hurt. Productivity will
be lost. Someone will quit. Maybe someone will benefit, but it's almost
certainly not good for your team or your company.

People agree to work for salaries. They put down numbers like what they earned
at their last job, or what they are looking for in the new job, and then
employers make offers based on that. If someone agreed to work for a number,
and is getting paid that... why make drama?

~~~
saiya-jin
naive and oversimplified view... are you an employee or employer? I don't have
issue negotiating salaries hard, but I personally know very bright people, who
for various reasons failed at that, and once they learned other people's
salaries (which happens eventually to most), they got extremely frustrated,
felt strong injustice and some left. I have more sympathy for community-based
approach rather than selfish everybody-for-themselves in this.

and no, you don't just come with any number you would like to see to an
interview. if you overshoot too much, you probably won't be hired, depends on
recruiter and company.

~~~
dbg31415
Well I manage a team, I have direct reports. I can tell you that Sally and
Steve and Joe all have the same job title, but Joe is a rockstar and earns
more, and Steve is a slacker who got the job because he knew someone. So when
the averages come out, and Sally gets pissed because she's not making what Joe
is making... that's what causes drama.

Pay really does, more often than not, reflect the individuals contributions.
Why? Because as Joe's manager, I want to keep Joe. I know what market rate is
for his position, and I do what I can to make sure he is paid above it.
Steve... fuck that guy, let him make below average... he didn't deserve the
job in the first place, and we'd all be better off if he quit.

Anyway the fact that it's not by name (so you can compare yourself to another
person) makes it worse in my mind. If you are just going to share the salary
for your position, we'd need to make different positions for Steve, Sally, and
Joe... It would be Title Blah, Rank Joe. Everyone is different.

All names changed of course.

