In a class action discrimination lawsuit, Google has agreed to pay $118 million to about 15,300 women employees in the US across 236 job roles. Additionally, an independent labour economist and expert will be appointed to evaluate the hiring and pay-equity practices at the company.
Kelly Ellis, Holly Pease, Kelli Wisuri, and Heidi Lamar, who worked with Google had filed a lawsuit against the Company in 2017 accusing Google of paying women employees less than their male counterparts. They had pointed out a level processing issue at the tech company.
Ellis worked with Google as a software engineer for four years at its Mountain view office and left the company as a senior manager. Pease worked for over 10 years with the company in various technical leadership roles. Wisuri worked for Google for more than two years, while Lamar worked as a pre-school teacher at the Google’s Children’s Centre.
The post-settlement work will be supervised by an external monitor for a period of over three years. The court will now set a hearing date for preliminary settlement approval, which, if approved, will result in the third-party administrator issuing notice to the class members.
During the lawsuit, it was alleged that Google not only paid women less but also put them on low career tracks, granted them smaller bonuses as compared to the men in the workforce. In 2021, Google agreed to pay $3.8 million to the US Department of Labour following accusations that it had discriminated against women and Asians.
