
U.S. judge approves $415M settlement in tech worker lawsuit - evmar
http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/09/03/apple-google-ruling-idUSL1N11908520150903
======
staunch
This conspiracy is by far the most intentionally evil thing tech companies
have ever been caught doing. Also the worst thing Steve Jobs did in his life.

~~~
snarfy
I'm still pissed at Google for falling into this. From a company that prides
itself on not being evil, it was clearly an evil practice. I'm not too pissed
though. I understand Steve had his distortion bubble and Larry had stars in
his eyes. It's sad to see the integrity break down. It makes me not trust
Google to always do the right thing because I don't trust Larry to.

~~~
cryoshon
"Don't be evil" is just a slogan. Same as any other company's slogan. There
isn't any integrity to begin with unless there's a market incentive for it,
and there isn't.

~~~
crdoconnor
I like to think they were just being sarcastic.

~~~
retbull
I feel like at first it probably was a very good slogan. The founders were
interested in following through but as they got further and further form their
employees the numbers just looked too nice.

This does not excuse they for being assholes but I can see how it happened.

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GreaterFool
Surprisingly uninformative article!

If I recall correctly per-person damages are staggering $6500.

~~~
littletimmy
Staggering? I'd call it a pittance. The companies should've been fined much
more to make an example out of them so no tech firm attempts something like
this again.

~~~
vidar
Pretty sure thats a sarcastic use of the word staggering

~~~
antjanus
That's what it sounded like to me as well.

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WalterBright
This cartel had 4 members. With all the Silicon Valley tech companies, it's a
little hard to see how this would be successful at holding down compensation.

In any case, cartels have a historical reputation of being unworkable without
laws being passed to force conformance. The problem for the cartel members is
they have large incentives to cheat on the agreement.

Probably the most famous cartel is OPEC. "Jeff Colgan argued in 2013 that,
since 1982, countries cheated on their quotas 96% of the time, largely
neutralizing the ability of OPEC to collectively influence prices."

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OPEC](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OPEC)

~~~
rayiner
Cartels are dynamically unstable. That doesn't mean they can't cause a net
social loss during the period in which they are effective.

~~~
WalterBright
I looked at some of the articles on this particular cartel. I didn't see
evidence presented that employees of the cartel were compensated less than
employees at other tech companies.

While there is no doubt there was an illegal cartel, I'm skeptical that it was
an effective cartel.

~~~
x0x0
When this scheme came to light, google ended up giving their employees a 10%
across the board raise. Further, google is often used as a compensation
benchmark.

[http://www.wsj.com/articles/SB100014240527487035236045756052...](http://www.wsj.com/articles/SB10001424052748703523604575605273596157634)

    
    
       Nov 10 2010
       
       Moving to plug the defection of staff to competitors, Google Inc. is giving 
       a 10% raise to all of its 23,000 employees, according to people familiar 
       with the matter.

~~~
WalterBright
That's strong evidence the cartel was a failure.

~~~
x0x0
The opposite. When they had to stop constraining wages, they were forced to
give raises to their employees. That is the definition of success: from 2005
to most of 2010, they successfully underpaid.

~~~
WalterBright
Not successfully, because other companies paid more and were draining away
Google's talent. I would also suspect that Google paid less not because of the
cartel, but because of the stock options. Once the stock stopped rising
dramatically, engineers would not have settled for less salary.

Microsoft went through a similar transition.

Creating a cartel is one thing, but making it work is quite another.

~~~
x0x0
On termination of cartel agreement, they had to immediately boost wages. A
cartel doesn't have to be 100% effective to be, nonetheless, effective. And
they had just re-priced options in early 2009.

~~~
WalterBright
The article doesn't mention the cartel as being a factor, it mentions
aggressive poaching by other companies.

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olalonde
Does anyone know how all that money will be distributed?

~~~
thescrewdriver
Given the amounts involved likely as a single McDonalds meal voucher per
recipient.

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smtddr
I commented on this a year ago or so:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8154909](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8154909)

My opinion on this is unchanged and I'm still disturbed by the greed behind
this lawsuit.

~~~
littletimmy
I am more disturbed at the greed behind the original injustice. The tech
companies should be punished, the greed of the plaintiffs is completely
irrelevant.

~~~
spacecowboy_lon
Why is it greed if a walmart worker was being stiffed of a dollar an hour its
just as bad as a sales guy losing 20% of a five figure bonus.

~~~
crdoconnor
Walmart workers and stiffed tech workers have more in common than the "masters
of the universe" who rule them both.

~~~
JoeAltmaier
That's a reach. Minimum-wage workers live an order of magnitude differently
than either of the others.

~~~
crdoconnor
Yet both are still reliant upon their labor for their livelihood.

~~~
JoeAltmaier
...for some definitions of the word 'labor'.

A difference is, working for minimum wage leaves you at risk of housing, food,
health. Anyone who escapes the trap of too-poor-to-live inhabits a different
world.

~~~
crdoconnor
They still have much more in common than either do with tech billionaires or
the land owners to whom they both pay half of their income to in rent.

There are laborers - minimum wagers and programmers alike - and there those
who are parasitic on the labor of others - CEOs, landlords, financiers. That's
the _real_ American divide.

Not "scraping by" vs "not scraping by".

~~~
JoeAltmaier
Philosophy aside, after your living is secure all the rest is imaginary
points. It has to mean less than risk-of-death or living in poverty. Maybe not
to a 20-something idealist; but definitely to a parent.

~~~
littletimmy
I agree. Let's take these imaginary points away from corporations. They're
imaginary, they shouldn't care.

~~~
JoeAltmaier
Basic Income! Agreed!

