After Long Fight, Google Workers Due $20 Apiece

Google will pay $27 million to settle a lawsuit alleging it silenced employees through "evil" and illegal policies. It's "the largest agreement of its kind," per Semafor. But it's "a drop in the bucket" for Google, whose parent company "turned almost $20 billion in profit last quarter alone," per SFGate. It notes the 96,939 employees involved will receive a rather measly sum: between $20 and $79 each, depending on the length of their employment. California's Private Attorneys General Act authorizes aggrieved employees to file suit to recover civil penalties on behalf of themselves, other employees, and the state, with the Labor and Workforce Development Agency taking 75% of penalties or settlements. A third of the remaining sum will cover attorneys' fees, leaving $4.4 million for employees to split.

The suit was filed in 2016 by a product manager at Google-owned Nest, who was fired after complaining about his employer on Facebook. Google claimed the individual had violated confidentiality rules. The plaintiff claimed Google's confidentiality agreements violated California labor law by blocking workers from disclosing earnings and working conditions and from reporting rule violations to the Securities and Exchange Commission. The lawsuit marked the start of a wave of employee activism across the tech industry, as companies including Facebook, Netflix, and Uber began facing whistleblower complaints and employee walkouts, according to Semafor's Reed Albergotti. Around that time, tech companies "went from dorm-room startups to multinational behemoths seemingly overnight," he writes.

Google revised its data classification guidelines in 2017. It also reinstated the product manager, who "went on to have a good career there," writes Albergotti. He calls the settlement, revealed in California state court documents and still subject to court approval, "more of a moral victory" for employees, but a "consequential and pioneering" one nonetheless. In response, Google says "our policies simply do not, and have never, unlawfully limited our employees' ability to talk about their terms and conditions or report violations of law." But "after nearly eight years of litigation, Google decided that resolution of the matter, without any admission of wrongdoing, is in the best interest of everyone." (More Google stories.)