Silicon Valley Fights Order To Pay Bigger Settlement In Tech Talent Hiring Case

The Washington Post carries a story from the Associated Press that says the big companies hit hardest by Judge Lucy Koh's ruling in the "No Poaching" case have not suprisingly appealed that ruling, which found that a proposed settlement of $324.5 million to a class-action lawsuit was too low. The suit, filed on behalf of 60,000 high-tech workers allegedlly harmed by anti-competitive hiring practices, will probably enter its next phase next January or March. (Judge Koh is probably not very popular at Apple in particular.) If you're one of those workers (or in an analogous situation), what kind of compensation or punitive action do you think is fair?

Comments

Re:Punitive Damages?

[jonsmirl]

You have to wonder how much the employees were really hurt by this. It was a 'no poaching' agreement. That meant that recruiters from those companies weren't going to call down the entire Rolodex of the competing firms and try to recruit. But.... there are nothing stopping external recruiters from doing that. And there was nothing stopping individuals from switching on their own.

There's some logic to an agreement like that. Each of these firm's recruiters could waste huge amounts of employee time in their competitors by making thousand of recruiting calls.

Unseal the documentation too

[beakerMeep]

The thing we really need here is public justice. If the world does not know how these ultra rich are conspiring against them, then there is no justice. They need to unseal all of the evidence, no exceptions.

Also I think it's important to note one of the plaintiffs (Michael Devine) who pushed the judge into ruling against this, the lawyers wanted to walk away with their check.

From a May 2014 CNET article

Plaintiff fights Apple, Google settlement in wage-fixing suit

A programmer who is part of the class action lawsuit against several tech giants says $324 million isn't enough.
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"As an analogy," Devine wrote to Koh, according to the Times, "if a shoplifter is caught on video stealing a $400 iPad from the Apple Store, would a fair and just resolution be for the shoplifter to pay Apple $40, keep the iPad, and walk away with no record or admission of wrongdoing? Of course not."

Had the case gone to trial as planned at the end of May, court filings indicate, the tech employees would have sought $3 billion. Lucasfilm, Pixar, and Intuit agreed to settle last year for a combined $20 million, covering 8 percent of the employees named in the suit.

Re:Punitive Damages?

[s.petry]

Yes, they absolutely were. The only way to get raises these days is to find a new job, no this is not restricted to Silicon Valley. If you sit in the same job you will be lucky to get a wage increase close to the cost of living increase each year. This particular illegal activity restricted people from getting new higher paying jobs, for years. Even if they were qualified for the jobs (which these same companies claim don't exist and lobby for increases in H1B people).

The 60,000 people that were impacted by this particular crime will see maybe 1,000.00, so the punishment is not severe enough. The judge should cap the attorney fees on this and quadruple the fine to ensure fair compensation for the people harmed by these criminal acts.

If this sounds harsh, consider that some of the executives responsible are making 100 times the wage of the employees harmed by their crimes. Perhaps they should get fired and face personal liability to their previous employers for their criminal activities.