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Google pays $11M to job-seekers who alleged age discrimination
- mbrumlow 7y agoWhy are these numbers so small? Even more so to the fine for data protection violations. The point of these sort of things are to make companies think twice. While 11m is a lot of cash it is nothing compared to Google's total income, and would not even been half a years salary for those they refused to hire. Seems like they got let off easy on this one.
- eej71 7y agoConsidering that it is a claim from a _prospective_ employee about the interview process, the settlement of 35k per person seems relatively generous.
- josefx 7y agoConsidering what they would have earned the first year at Google if they weren't discriminated against that looks more like a drop in the bucket.
- dmitrygr 7y agoDoesn't your statement assume that they were all good enough to actually be hired?
- shados 7y agoAll good enough to be hired AND that if they were, that the job they eventually did get paid substantially less. That is very possible, but it's still a loaded assumption indeed.
- josefx 7y agoThey were all good enough to get in person interviews at least[1]. If I read that document correctly Google would have been able to argue about the qualifications of various individuals and have them removed from the lawsuit after discovery concluded. Of course I am not a lawyer so I might be wrong. [1]see court document on https://www.bizjournals.com/dallas/bizwomen/news/latest-news/2017/08/nearly-300-have-joined-google-age-case.html https://www.bizjournals.com/dallas/bizwomen/news/latest-news...
- dmitrygr 7y agoPhone screens at google are not foolproof, and some candidates get to skip them for various reasons. I've seem some candidates make it to onsite and then be unable to answer my warmup question of: write a function that takes an integer, leaves all the zero bits alone, changes all the one bits into zero bits, and returns the result.
- pcwalton 7y agoHow is a disguised return 0 anything remotely resembling a good question? I highly suspect most people who are "unable to answer" are actually just misunderstanding the question, since it's phrased in such a bizarre way. The way you phrased it, I'm not even 100% sure that "return 0" is the answer you're looking for!
- ghaff 7y agoThat’s the right return value of course but ignoring everything else doesn’t actually meet the requirements of the question. Of course in a live situation you can ask if that’s ok or if they actually want useless bit twiddling.
- pcwalton 7y agoBut there's no such thing, semantically, as "leaving zero bits alone". The value 0 has no notion of "where it came from". The expression "x & 0" is semantically equivalent to the expression "0", in that they represent the same value. In my view, the fact that the question even lends itself to philosophical debate like this just illustrates how exceptionally bad the question is, even by Google standards.
- smt88 7y ago"Generous" is hard for me to have an opinion about. $11M is less than a rounding error for Google. "Fair" isn't as hard. It's not fair, if (as I suspect) Google is guilty of age discrimination. There should be greater consequences than just trying to pay people what they might've lost financially from the discrimination. Or, to put it another way: Google deserves to be punished if this was actually happening.
- jaclaz 7y agoIf you see it from the other side, it is more than 50,000 for each of the 200 people, even if the lawyers will likely get 1/3 of that, it remains 35,000 US$ or so. For what? Having been NOT hired (but making it to the interview). Presumably, even if a bit "old" according to Google standards, these people are anyway "top notch" in programming and almost surely soon found an appropriate job at some other company. So, the compensation is seemingly very hypothetical, covering what? 2-3 months of wages for someone hypothetically getting 140,000-200,000 US$ per year. Or is it because the applicant could have been hired at 160,000 US$ per year but only makes - poor little thing - 125,000 US$ from the company that hired him/her, and so first year is covered?
- mbrumlow 7y agoEngineers at google can make way over 200k in salary and even more in total compensation. Given these guys were over 40, and many of them likely seasoned it is likely they would have made way more than the numbers you are suggesting.
- jaclaz 7y agoI don't doubt that, it was just an attempt to put the numbers in pespective, if you believe that it is only 1 month or 15 days of wage it is ok as well, but what was the actual inconvenience to them? Let's bring it to the extreme, 35,000 US$ for the hassle of making four (fruitless) interviews?
- onemoresoop 7y ago
- uhahahu 7y agoare you saying you know the best interest of the people who accepted the settlement?
- will4274 7y ago> Please respond to the strongest plausible interpretation of what someone says, not a weaker one that's easier to criticize.
- tdb7893 7y agoHow much would've it cost to actually litigate this? I'm wondering if this settlement was similar to how much it would've cost to litigate and they just wanted the people to go away.
- ihuman 7y agoIsn't it normal for class-action lawsuits to have a low payout per person?
- thfuran 7y agoIt's definitely normal for the class members to receive little payout per person, but a lot of that tends to have to do with astronomical legal expenses.
- Teknoman117 7y agoThe real winners of the current setup are legal firms. Doesn't matter who is suing who, or who wins or loses. Lawyers are going to get paid.
- lawnchair_larry 7y agoIn a class action, lawyers don’t get paid if they lose.
- Karunamon 7y agoI had it described to me that class actions are less about making the wronged parties whole, and more about forming large enough sticks to beat misbehaving entities about the head with.
- lonelappde 7y agoNo. Lawyers get about half. That's a lot, but class members each getting a pittance isn't much different from getting twice a pittance. Substantial payments to everyone in a class would wipe out the defendant.
- thfuran 7y agoIs that actually bad? I'm not really sure why preserving entities that severely wrong large classes is necessarily a desirable goal.
- jonas21 7y agoThis is just speculation, but... The plaintiffs may have settled because they thought it was unlikely they would prevail if this went to trial, so it would be better take a guaranteed payout. Google may have settled because they figured that the PR hit of a lengthy age discrimination trial would be worth more than $11M, regardless of whether they won.
- mejarc 7y agoI doubt any company, especially in SV, takes a PR hit from age discrimination, which seems to be widely accepted and barely punished. Google just wants to swat away the plaintiffs like annoying gnats.
- dvtrn 7y agoAlthough it has settled the case, Google denies the allegations that it was unfairly dismissive of older applicants. Why is Google still making denials and statements after settling the action?
- geodel 7y agoMaybe because it is settled and not proven in court?
- dvtrn 7y agoMaybe because it is settled Right, this is why it confuses me because it's been declared settled, a formal resolution outside of the court, the matter is resolved independently between the parties. It seems odd to settle this kind of class-action allegation while continue making statements about it after the fact. Is my understanding of this incorrect?
- will4274 7y agoYes. Companies often issue press statements after settling a case.
- ocdtrekkie 7y agoSettlement offers this fun gap where they've paid people to not pursue them further, but don't have to actually admit they did anything wrong. And obviously, Google doesn't want people to believe they discriminate against people unfairly, so of course if they legally can, they're going to stand by their position that they don't. Even if they do and had to pay people to settle a case for it.
- dvtrn 7y agoAnd obviously, Google doesn't want people to believe they discriminate against people unfairly, so of course if they legally can, they're going to stand by their position that they don't This is about on par with where my thinking was on this. I'm aware that these settlements are often contingent upon agreements from both parties regarding disclosing details of the settlement, and I suppose I assumed there was something in place here that prevented parties from speaking out about the settlement other than to release a statement saying 'a settlement was reached'. Evidently not the case here. Thanks.
- gregfjohnson 7y agoTangentially related: I just turned 65, and am continuing to immensely enjoy programming. Current job involves embedded digital signal processing in medical devices. My family came up with a new name for my category of programmers: the gerihacktric demographic.. :-) I have interviewed with Alphabet twice, no offers. One time apparently it was a close call.. It would be fun to be the all-time record holder for oldest new hire!
- moflome 7y agoLove it. Have found that the closer you get to hardware groups at any of the FAANG's, the higher the average age. Met several happily employed grandparents in the groups, adding value and telling the best stories.
- rifung 7y ago> Have found that the closer you get to hardware groups at any of the FAANG's, the higher the average age. Hm that makes sense given the relative infancy of the software industry. Not to mention that enrollment in CS programs has been increasing so the talent pool is skewed towards younger people
- xiphias2 7y agoIt's great, that you got to interview stage. What I mostly found that most discrimination happens before someone gets to the interview phase, which makes sense, as it makes interviewing cheaper. Most old people don't learn as many new things as younger ones, which makes it harder for older people who do to get the chance to prove themselves.
- danielscrubs 7y agoI'd say they already know the paradigms & architectures so they don't throw themselves at the latest fad as easily and above all seem to value family more highly and lets be honest. Back in the day you had to learn some pretty amazing tech (assembler and low memory data structures) just to get by. But yeah, just today there was a comment here on Hacker News saying (I'm paraphrasing): I learnt C then C++ then Java, then enough was enough. Which is just sad, that's like going from oatmeal to porrige.
- throwaway6hhgxx 7y agoThrowaway because I work at Google. I interviewed Cheryl Fillekes twice. I did not know her age, and it did not matter. Her issue was incompetence. One of the very few "strong no hire" ratings I ever gave out.
- kevinherron 7y ago> Throwaway because I work at Google. I interviewed Cheryl Fillekes twice. I did not know her age, and it did not matter. He issue was incompetence. One of the very few "strong no hire" ratings I ever gave out. Why bother with a throwaway... sounds like you've narrowed it down pretty well if ever investigated.
- sjg007 7y agoThe OP got flagged, so I will post here. -- Assuming what you say is true, it seems odd Google would have you interview the same person twice. It also seems statistically unlikely that they would get the same interviewer, unless the role was specialized. But then why would she have been interviewed 4 separate times? It's also weird that you are writing about it here.. I would assume you'd have been told not to discuss it and are probably bound by the settlement to not discuss it either. Remind us of what the definition of incompetence is?
- bjhkx 7y agoWhy is this comment flagged but can be replied to and it's not hidden from view?
- rdtsc 7y agoTechnically they didn't admit guilt, but from a PR point of view they did. So from that respect, they probably opened themselves up for further scrutiny from future applicants whether they engaged in ageism or not. I suspect they feared during the discovery process things would be found in the internal communications that do show some kind of -ism or other things that would just look bad for them, so throwing $11m at the problem to go away quickly seemed better.
- moksly 7y agoRecently the Danish company KMD was caught utilising a no hiring of anyone above the age of 36 policy. A practice they’ve apparently used for a decade. That’s illegal and they’ll likely be punished, but the interesting part is that they are doing terrible. They have the largest amount of scandals, the largest amount of settlements for not meeting what they promised and the largest financial drop of any major Danish IT company. This could be happening for a range of reasons. With hiring practices like that, their management is probably questionable, but hiring young certainly doesn’t seem to have helped them much.
- WalterBright 7y ago> but hiring young certainly doesn’t seem to have helped them much. A proper team has a mix of old and young, because they bring different skills to the table. Young people tend to be more energetic and enthusiastic, while older people have already learned that you don't store customer passwords unencrypted and check that backups are being done.
- blub 7y agoIf it took 10 years to discover an official policy in a major company, good fucking luck demonstrating discrimination in 99% of the cases.
- djhworld 7y agoHow does this work for the claimants, do they get ~$50,000 each (it says more than 200 people but doesn't quantify it) or do the legal costs swallow up most of that
- erentz 7y agoAccording to Ars they get about $35k: > Of the $11 million payout in the settlement, $2.75 million will go to lawyers representing the class, Bloomberg reports. Fillekes will get an extra $10,000 as the lead plaintiff. The remaining cash works out to around $35,000 per plaintiff. https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2019/07/google-pays-11-million-to-settle-227-age-discrimination-claims/ https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2019/07/google-pays-11-m...
- csunbird 7y agoAs always, lawyers get paid, not actual plaintiff.
- ramblerman 7y agoThat seems kind of low. I would assume software engineers capable of interviewing at google would be somewhat well off, and take the risk for a bigger payout. Perhaps the law firm had final say?
- mcguire 7y ago"Instead, the company argues that the members of the class-action suit failed to demonstrate technical prowess..." Yes, it's a widely known fact that people over the age of 27 lose a year's worth of "technical prowess" for every year they live. By the time someone is 50, they're barely capable of operating a spoon.
- redwards510 7y agodemonstrate technical prowess = be able to regurgitate your last Data Structures and Algorithms college course. This is how they get away with their blatant ageism, ask questions only young, recent grads would know. Why don't they just require candidates to list five mumble rap artists or Instagram influencers?
- knolax 7y ago> Why don't they just require candidates to list five mumble rap artists or Instagram influencers? This bitterness and contempt for the younger generation might be why a company full of young people might be reluctant to hire you.
- jayd16 7y agoGoogle's screeners always ask theoretical algorithm questions. I've failed a couple because I have an industry taught agile mindset of "good enough", not the fresh out of college pure optimization mindset they're looking for. I realize two days later, "oh they wanted that look ahead optimization grep uses" or some such thing. "Prowess" isn't the word I would use but I could easily see how Google can turn away good programmers for technical reasons.
- zerr 7y agoInteresting, their current interview practices is age discrimination - i.e. they are tailored for fresh grads. I wonder if every non-fresh-grad candidate is eligible for such compensation :)
- intrasight 7y agoI've interacted with several Googlers over the hears who said point-blank that Google won't hire people over 40.
- davidgay 7y agoI can prove (by counterexample) that this statement is false - I was hired at 41. In fact, I'm somewhat dubious that there's any googler who doesn't have a reasonably close colleague hired above the age of 40.
- nappy-doo 7y agoThat's funny, I was just rehired at Google. I'm over 40. 4/6 of my coworkers are over 40. I sat on hiring committee for 4 years before I left a couple of years ago (FB is a terrible place to work, BTW), and we _NEVER_ discussed the age of a candidate. Looking around my office (a major US office), and I'd estimate > 50% are over 40.
- Itaxpica 7y agoFully half of my current team at Google will be very surprised to hear that
- tictoc 7y agoWhat's the reasoning behind not hiring older developers? Besides the lack of flexibility in personality and old guy sentiments, they are usually solid developers and have a lot of knowledge. I've learned so many things by osmosis by just being around them. Is it solely that they can grind young developers into the ground at a low salary? Nearly every young developer in my short time as a developers thinks they are Mr. Robot, whereas the older guys give a much better sense of what programming is really all about in the context of reality.
- trhway 7y agoVery fun link inside the article https://www.businessinsider.com/jk-scheinberg-apple-engineer-rejected-job-apple-store-genius-bar-2016-9 https://www.businessinsider.com/jk-scheinberg-apple-engineer... "JK Scheinberg, the engineer who spent 21 years working at Apple and is best known for persuading Steve Jobs to move the Mac from PowerPC to Intel in 2005, was rejected from a job at an Apple store a few years later. " I wonder if Woz himself would pass the muster :)
- solotronics 7y agoWill anything happen if you lie about your age on an application? I don't see how your age, race, or sex should be taken into consideration unless you are doing a job that requires strenous physical labor.
- rikroots 7y agoIn the UK it is against the law to ask people for their age on an application form (eg: no date of birth field). Also against the law to ask questions at interview which can be interpreted as ageist. The only exceptions are for legislated occupations such as joining the armed forces.
- redwards510 7y agoEven if you avoid providing your DOB, you almost always have to put the year you graduated college, and that makes it pretty easy to ballpark age.
- rongenre 7y agoI leave my graduation date off -- it's never been a problem.
- carmenbr 7y agoLast month we launched our website/job board to fight ageism in tech we had a huge response launching here on HN and I believe it’s a hidden problem we need to tackle. https://noageismintech.com https://noageismintech.com
- atemerev 7y agoAnecdotal: was recently trying to apply to one of Google’s engineering positions in Zürich (I already tried to do that 7 years ago, did not pass the interview, now I think I am better equipped) Got a referral from one of my Googler friends. In 2 days, I’ve got a very dismissive letter from Google, which amounted to “we decided that your profile and experience is no match for this position — and by the way, don’t bother applying to other similar positions at other Google offices. Case closed”. My CV only got better since my last interview at Google, and while I didn’t pass it with flying colors, it wasn’t completely bad, too. I wonder if my current age played the part. Meanwhile, at Google jobs site, there were many positions marked as “fresh alumni of 2019 only” — perhaps that’s their perfect target.
- jayd16 7y agoOr, you know, they just have entry level positions and don't want to pay for a senior dev.
- dangerboysteve 7y ago$38,500 per person assuming 30% fee going to lawyers. Seems kind of low.
- atdrummond 7y agoI'd love to hire some talented individuals with this level of experience. Any recommendations on where I can post positions that don't attract the typical west coast brogrammer set?
- kvonhorn 7y ago> don't attract the typical west coast brogrammer set Isn't this just discrimination against a different demographic?
- pmiller2 7y agoMaybe, but you know it is totally legal to discriminate against people under 40 in the US, right? Not saying it’s ethical or otherwise a good idea, but it won’t get the DoL on your case.
- bennybob 7y agoI'm 37, I'm starting to get worried about my age being a problem. But to hell with blaming employers who don't want me, it's their call. I think that maybe the actual problem is that by 40 they expect that I should be leading teams not just stuck at senior dev. Personally I want out of tech as I see supply and demand acting on wages (I'm in UK). Pretty soon, as far as I can estimate, it will go the way manufacturing went in the west: gone or heavily unionised blue collar like Germany which I don't want to be.
- lazyant 7y agoI was offered to join this lawsuit but I didn't because I didn't feel discriminated or anything.