It feels like these things become self-fulfilling prophecies, because of the way this issue is reported on. If "seven of nine technology companies, including Apple, Amazon.com and Microsoft, [disclosed] that data", would it be too much for an article to compare the unofficial Google numbers to that data?<p>I'm not a big fan of large companies, I don't think they can win. Even if you have good numbers, that doesn't fit the narrative of "Silicon Valley has established itself as the boys’ club". Say for example, we applauded companies who are doing better, maybe even close to statistical significance, then you could say, "Hey, it's still not quite there yet, but it's close and we're doing better than others. Come work for us and help us make it right." And then that would be actionable advice, and companies would have a great reason to strive for this. But we'd also have to be honest about statistical error rates, and maybe some other stuff.<p>I'll close on this, I've heard people say stupid and offensive shit when they're drunk, but never "Hey, let's pay women less", although I'm not an executive. So I feel like it isn't a common thought... unless you keep reading articles like this one.
> At Google, Employee-Led Effort Finds Software Engineers Are Paid More Than Front-End Developers<p>> At Google, Employee-Led Effort Finds Data Scientists Are Paid More Than Web Designers<p>> At Google, Employee-Led Effort Finds AI Researchers Are Paid More Than Project Managers<p>I could do this all day...<p>Any chance they'll release the data that backs up this statistical claim?
For a good (if scary) insight into the "hidden bias" and "forced diversity" culture inside Google, have a listen to the recent James Damore interview at Joe Rogan's podcast:<p><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uQ1JeII0eGo" rel="nofollow">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uQ1JeII0eGo</a><p>They recount the ways people have been misrepresenting James' (rather meek) position, right down to accusations of sexism, nazism, malicious removal of academic references and outright lies. A sad testimony of this day and age and the current media climate in the US.<p>It's like people think covering their ears shouting "LALALA NOT TRUE, WILL NOT DISCUSS" has ever been a constructive way of addressing social issues.<p>I wish Google would come clean and release the raw stats. I understand that's one politically loaded and sensitive dataset, but nothing beats drawing your own conclusions. Right now, Google is getting flak from all sides, lose-lose.
I don't understand why Google gets so much heat when they seem to be one of the better companies in the world in regards to diversity.<p>I've been at several companies where literally all managers are men and women no more than objects that are hired based on their looks. Executive meetings are spent discussing female coworkers attributes and who has managed to get laid with who.
I'd ask what constitutes "same level", and what's the overtime gap between genders, if there is one, but why do that when we can have a good ol' laugh at how Google made their own bed, and now we can watch them use the same "it's more complicated than that" arguments used by people who Google think are "propagating sexist stereotypes".
I keep wondering what is the economical explanation for the existence of the gender pay gap?<p>Assuming women and men employees are (generally speaking) equally skilled yet differently compensated (for whatever reason), rational employers would actually <i>prefer</i> to hire women over men. Just like with any other purchase, all things being equal, cheaper is better.<p>Perhaps "old" companies with a "tradition" might have a status-quo bias, but new startups/smart CEOs that really try to minimize their burn rate would obviously see this.<p>Over time more and more women employees would be sought after more then men, which would eventually lead to an equilibrium and remove the pay gap.<p>So why hasn't this happened (yet)?
One of the things this misses is that even if these numbers were even, systemic gender bias means that things would likely be unfair.<p>Even if Google were perfectly fair internally, women coming in from academia are likely to have faced gender bias [1], meaning less impressive resumes and therefore lower starting positions. Similar logic applies to women coming in from industry: one component to hiring pay and title is previous pay and title; external bias can easily be imported.<p>But it would be a miracle if Google were perfectly fair internally given our society's long history of sexism, documented gender bias in academia (from which Google draws some of its culture and a lot of its people), and the ongoing issues in the tech industry. I'd expect Google's promotion ladder to reflect that to one extent or another, meaning that the levels themselves have some level of bias to them.<p>[1] e.g., <a href="http://www.pnas.org/content/109/41/16474.abstract" rel="nofollow">http://www.pnas.org/content/109/41/16474.abstract</a> and <a href="http://www.apa.org/pubs/journals/releases/apl-0000022.pdf" rel="nofollow">http://www.apa.org/pubs/journals/releases/apl-0000022.pdf</a>
It's unfortunate that Alphabet declined to present their data, that way we'd likely be able to correct for things like location and seniority along with having solid deviation rates.
Did they also look at the reasons why men are paid more?<p>Because "men are paid more than women" alone simply says NOTHING.<p>In the company I used to work there were HUGE salary differences between men with the same job title, and the difference sometimes could run up hundreds of euros. The main reason was that the better paid men negotiated their terms of employment WAY better than those that got paid less.<p>I suspect to see something very much alike here. Also, I would like to see the salary distribution within men and women, because I can almost certainly guarantee that some women are paid more than some men, but I don't think we will ever see that because that would destroy the entire "all men are paid more than women for no reason other than they are men" narrative some people are still trying to push, while it is related to a LOT of other things other than just pure gender.<p>BTW, if a salary difference is SUCH a big problem why stick with the companies who do this? Why not find employment somewhere else, or start your own company with better working conditions? It isn't like you are FORCED to work for Google or any other of the big corps in Silicon Valley if you don't like how they treat people there.
We would need a lot more data, I work for a much smaller company vs Google yet we can easily have people who while formally at a lower level can make beyond VP level comp. because of their unique tech. skills and experience. I imagine Google has a fairly large group of famous eng. etc. who could scew results greatly should they get to be part of the sample.
I wonder whether the effort in question was scientific. In particular, did it control for life-style (e.g., single without children, married with children)? Sociological results on sex-related biases have been reversed when properly controlled for this parameter [1], which warrants skepticism towards any study that doesn't give it a serious consideration.<p>[1] <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4418903/pdf/pnas.201418878.pdf" rel="nofollow">https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4418903/pdf/pna...</a>
It doesn't just matter that men are paid more than women, it also matters <i>why</i>. The article is more nuanced than the title on this point, but it still doesn't come off as very nuanced. But then none of the discussion around this topic ever does.
> The self-reported Google salary spreadsheet [...]<p>That's all I needed to see. Nothing worthwhile here. The people who'll tend to report will be the people who are worried about how much they earn. I'd say all this shows is that men are less worried about how much they earn than women.
<i>What Google pays men versus women is at the heart of a dispute with the Department of Labor. The company is fighting over how much data it needs to hand over</i><p>What are they hiding? They must know what that data will reveal is the only explanation.
This is useless, if you don't control for factors other than sex. Men tend to work longer hours, take fewer sick days.<p>Education and extra-curricular activities don't seem to be taken into account, which can easily explain the gap in the lower tiers.