Home » Employment News » Google pays $118 million to settle gender discrimination lawsuit

Google pays $118 million to settle gender discrimination lawsuit

By Nithya Bose in Employment News, posted June 13, 2022

Google has agreed to pay $118 million to settle a lawsuit alleging the tech giant had discriminated against women in salary and promotion.

The settlement resolves a class-action suit filed in San Francisco Superior Court in 2017 by three former female workers who claimed that Google assigned them to lower-level jobs than equally competent males, resulting in lesser pay.

The suit claimed Google also also refused the women employees' promotions or transfers to other teams, which would have allowed them to advance their careers further.

The settlement applies to around 15,500 female workers who worked for Google in California in 236 different job titles after September 2013.

As part of the agreement, Google's recruiting processes and pay equity studies will be reviewed by independent experts.

As part of the settlement, Google does not admit wrongdoing and a judge must still approve the terms of the settlement.

Google spokesman Chris Pappas said: “While we strongly believe in the equity of our policies and practices, after nearly five years of litigation, both sides agreed that resolution of the matter, without any admission or findings, was in the best interest of everyone, and we’re very pleased to reach this agreement,”.

He stated that the firm is committed to paying, recruiting, and leveling all workers fairly and equitably and that for the previous nine years, the company has conducted a pay-equity study to determine if wages, bonuses, and stock awards are fair.

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For years, the IT sector has fought charges that it is inadequate in its employment and treatment of women and minorities, and companies have long stated that they are striving to improve their diversity policies and practices.

The 2017 case against Google, which was resolved this month, followed discrimination allegations made by the Labor Department earlier that year as part of an audit of Google.

The department's charges were solved in a settlement last year in which Google agreed to pay more than $3.8 million to over 5,500 then-current female and Asian workers and job applicants who were found by the department to have been disadvantaged.

Google stated at the time that it invested extensively in equitable recruiting and remuneration policies.

Source: The Wall Street Journal

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