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Google says US employees can relocate to states with abortion rights
- karmasimida 4y agoThis makes sense. I fully agree with Google on sticking to this one. Do NOT fund states that suppress our rights.
- kjfdpoisfjkds 4y ago
- jollybean 4y agoDoes that include gun rights? I'm empathetic to the sentiment, but I think we have to be a bit proportional about this kind of stuff, because 'our rights' is a really, really broad thing, and every issue is different. For example, if this were more of a perfunctory argument about state vs. federal rights, and SCOTUS was really consistent about it, and this was a social issue that got caught up in a legal issue ... and otherwise 'pretty much most states had good rights' on this issue, well, then the whole thing would look different. So it's hard to make blanket statements about 'rights' and even specific issues are just full of nuance. It's probably a good decision by Google and they likely should apply some pragmatic pressure to help a resolution on this one. After Trump/Jan 6/Ongoing investigations, BLM protests, COVID, and literally Russian invasion of a major country, I thought 'Black Swan' season was over! My god man, this is just too much. Yet another 'big fight'. Hey Zeus. It'd be nice to have some centrist consensus on a lot of this because ironically people are not remotely as divided as it seems from the headlines. I think it's likely best of Bit Tech navigates these issues separately, with careful deliberation, 'doing the right thing' while not getting to populist about it ... because bigger question for Google, is 'what to do next'?.
- kevin_thibedeau 4y agoThere are no state vs. federal rights. No government entity grants American citizens their rights.
- humanrebar 4y agoRights extend to people who aren't citizens and living beings who aren't human as well, but nice reply.
- galangalalgol 4y agoThe left fears guns and tries to ban them, the right fears ideas and bans books from schools. The book V for vendetta has the line "ideas are bulletproof" so maybe the right is on to something? V is one of the books TX banned interestingly. But if you put a bullet through every NN that has the offending weights you will find ideas are not in fact bulletproof. Sadly our species has done this a few times to confirm.
- epistasis 4y agoWhen NYC PD was doing stop and frisk, pretty much nobody suggested that we boycott NUC based companies. This is all about status and which states we view as beneath our own. Trying to do economic sanctions as a whole has not been effective in recent state-wide rights deprivation legislation, and I don't think it will do much here either. We need to expand the court, have a civil war, or something like that. (I'm not sure if I'm kidding anymore, talking to relatives in red states shows a seething hatred of people with my beliefs that makes me think that at any moment all these people may take up arms like on Jan 6. It certainly seems like many have very violent thoughts and view the world as based on gun violence, and think that their blue state "enemies" will come for them wi try guns just as they fantasize about whipping out there own. It's truly sick)
- karmasimida 4y agoCould be I think something is already inconsolable in this country.
- galangalalgol 4y agoWhen TX first passed its law that allowed anyone to sue individuals that had or aided an abortion, Apple offered to pay for transport and the procedure for anyone at its new Austin campus. https://appleinsider.com/articles/21/09/17/apple-is-monitoring-legal-challenges-to-texas-abortion-law https://appleinsider.com/articles/21/09/17/apple-is-monitori...
- JKCalhoun 4y agoHonestly, Apple should be dialing down investment in Texas.
- newaccount2021 4y agoThe still-unfinished Austin campus will be the largest outside of Apple Park, so....
- grapeskin 4y agoIt's odd how many corporations have policies to help their employees escape the laws of places like Texas and Florida, but they're more than happy to relocate their offices to those states for small tax reductions. If they're truly against these policies, gutting those states of thousands of high earning jobs and refusing to build any new offices is the most effective way to do it. The Russian sanctions actually surprised me in that a lot of corporations actually pulled out and fast. I'll be even more surprised if they stay out for years to come.
- koolba 4y ago
- Afforess 4y agoThis reads as a cruel victory lap to me.
- Waterluvian 4y ago> Pretty sure all the States that would qualify for this are lower cost of living than any of the destination ones too. Sure says something about the uneducated “keep the baby” line that it’s the have-not states towing it.
- galangalalgol 4y agoI'm sure it does say something, but implying have-nots are in their situation because of a lack of education is rather unenlightened. The number one predictor of salary, is the salary of the parents. I would rather put forward that those with subsistence lifestyles sacrifice proportionately less wealth to have many children. So it perhaps is rational to keep children in those cultures and develop morals that encourage this. In more wealthy societies the cost per child is quite high with advanced education, and a lower likelihood that each child provides free labor to the family, so keeping a child is less rational.
- JKCalhoun 4y agoIf Google is like Apple, your salary is adjusted by the cost of living. So they would get a raise moving to a state that allows women the right to choose?
- thebradbain 4y ago> 24 weeks of maternity leave from Google You know these 24 weeks aren't a vacation, right? They're about 100x more demanding then the average tech job, and on-call 24/7. Not to mention that after the 24 weeks are up, you still have another unpaid (in fact, you are paying!) full time job of raising a child for at least another 17.5 years. That is a tall task for someone hoping to climb in their career, even if they want a child, and it's just not the right time right now. > Alternatively, keep the baby The great and wonderful thing about abortion is that, even when it's legalized, someone who wants to have their baby can still choose to, if they wish. Just as they can choose not to. And all of this is from the relatively cushy and overcompensated perspective of a tech career! Now imagine someone between minimum-wage jobs struggling to make rent every month. Do you know how many kids today were born and not given the time or resources from their parents to succeed, or worse, abused? Did you know the fact that – today – 1 in 2 people nationwide who are homeless were products of the foster care system [1] ? https://nfyi.org/issues/homelessness/ https://nfyi.org/issues/homelessness/
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- lettergram 4y agoI wonder if this is a business decision that has shown it could be profitable. I can imagine people without kids work more hours. Then again, they have a lot less to lose. Interesting business decision. The question I have, some states are going to call abortion murder and charge it as such. Is Google aiding and abetting a homicide?
- JKCalhoun 4y agoI assumed it was a decision relating to a woman's reproductive rights. To suggest it is a business decision is sort of debasing?
- sJ646U9k6c6gME9 4y agoFor-profit companies don’t care about anyone’s rights. To believe otherwise is naive.
- arroz 4y agoFor-profit companies are ruled by people, not robots, so it depends.
- tjr225 4y agoGoogle cares about attracting and retaining smart people. Smart people generally respect reproductive rights. So I guess in some ways you are correct, but not in the way your response to the person you are responding to would imply. What is interesting is that I guess the average google employee is in a good enough position in life to either afford birth control, get an abortion if they need one, or simply figure out how to make an unwanted pregnancy a good situation for their family. So I’m not really sure how this helps their employees other than making them look like they care about the most recent dramatic thing.
- jhawk28 4y agoThe split of pro/against is really close to 50/50. If you think that the smart people are only on one side or that only one side has "good" arguments, then you are living in a bubble. The argument over abortion was going on before Roe v Wade. Roe v Wade only prevented legislation from finding a solution.
- hedora 4y ago
- spywaregorilla 4y agoFun work perk: we're moving you to a location with a local culture you find abhorrent
- tomjakubowski 4y agoI get to lose some rights too? What a deal!
- hedora 4y agoYou get to lose them either way. The supreme court just rolled back the right to privacy with this ruling, and they've made it clear roll backs of gay rights, birth control bans and anti-sodomy laws are coming next.
- Dracophoenix 4y agoIt's not unprecedented. That was basically the premise of mandatory bussing: Force children to go schools they may not like simply to even out the racial proportion. Obviously, it didn't work.
- sangnoir 4y agoDo you think busing was for the culture - and not - giving access to better-funded schools?
- Dracophoenix 4y agoMandatory bussing wasn't for cultural purposes, at least not directly. But you seem to forget that the rulings didn't just give some kids access to better schools but also put kids in worse ones solely for the purpose of achieving a racial balance. Parents could pay high property taxes for a school they can't send their children to due to racial quotas. It's essentially a form of robbing Peter to pay Paul.
- caiquelira 4y agoIs it possible to avoid a flame war at this point? I believe this arricle is way too inflammatory, political and uninteresting for this forum.
- aaomidi 4y agoYou could for example, avoid the article and go comment on the ones you find more interesting. This is a serious issue and these articles are important. If anything they put pressure on more companies.
- JKCalhoun 4y agoIf we only posted articles lacking in controversy that would be uninteresting.
- HKH2 4y agoNope. There are plenty of challenging problems that are not controversial, and disagreements can be dealt with amicably. You can have friendly opponents/competitors.
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- DonHopkins 4y ago
- roflyear 4y agoEh I guess that's kinda what they did.
- DonHopkins 4y agoNo, it's not what they did, quite the opposite. Their account is almost two years old, yet that was their first post ever. What they should have done was to continue to not post telling other people what they should not discuss. They were doing just fine for almost two years not commenting on discussions they were not interested in or telling people what not to talk about, and they should have continued that trend instead of spoiling it. It's always the ones who have reprehensible unjustifiable politics they don't want to discuss, who can't tolerate other people discussing politics.
- jleyank 4y agoIgnoring abortion, I suspect that states without contraception, IVF or gay rights will be of less interest to a significant portion of the tech workforce. Companies would have to provide alternatives unless they want to limit their hiring to red state natives. Good argument for wfh to get talent that just won’t go there. Note that most contraceptives prevent implantation and IVF creates more embryos than needed. Both are no-no’s under the new regime. And miscarriages and stillbirths are going to be a legal minefield there.
- abernard1 4y agoI suspect, having had a long career in tech, no one of import will care. "The Industry" is an embarrassment. It is lazy, incompetent, and would be drowning if not for its oligopoly status. Companies who produce useful software will win out over the lackadaisical tech culture that exists today. What the people bemoaning this decision should worry about is the regulatory backlash against technology--coming from the right--which they totally ignored and pretended was not possible. This decision is a precursor to that inevitability.
- jleyank 4y agoErr, having had a long career in tech, I’ve found that companies like to hire younger people. Those who might be sexually active, considering starting families and trying to balance career requirement vs pregnancies. Such as young professors, rising developers, pretty much every aspect of stem. While the regulatory backlash is a concern, I would think that attracting or keeping staff is a larger concern.
- abernard1 4y agoAnd I, having seen Austin, TX grow from a laughingstock to an industry powerhouse, find your points humorous. There is a very big elephant in the room for where people are moving. And those people are young. And those people do not have the belief monoculture that has existed prior. Smaller elephant in the room #2 is that cost pressures and globalism don't care about the opinions of the traditional PMC that has reigned supreme when tech was on the upswing.
- gedy 4y agoWhy only US states? I don't remember this for Google's offices in Mexico, Ireland, et al.
- ncallaway 4y agoBoth Mexico and Ireland allow abortion.
- gedy 4y agoWithin past year or two, Google has been there much longer.
- SauciestGNU 4y agoIf I had to guess, it's because in neither of those locations did people lose rights that they had previously been granted. This is a substantive shift in peoples' bodily autonomy. If you don't want theocratic fascists inspecting your body, all of a sudden you have to uproot.
- frollo 4y agoProbably because you can move between U.S. states without a visa, which is required to permanently work in another country. I feel like Google could do something similar between it's different offices in the Schengen area, but moving from Ireland to Mexico or from USA to Italy is going to require a lot more work and paperwork than most people are willing to put in, especially if there's a simpler option already available.
- kepler1 4y ago
- woodruffw 4y agoAs with so many things in politics, the change in the status quo is perceived as more important (or at least more salient) than an existing bad situation. Is that fair? Not necessarily. But it’s intuitive, in terms of individuals and companies adapting to a suddenly changed playing field. By comparison, Saudi Arabia’s policies are nothing new.
- joshl32532 4y agoBecause Google is an AMERICAN company, and losing the abortion right is a HUGE deal? Especially for Google employees who relocated to conservative states for the job? Next question?
- KMag 4y agoAbortion rights are a huge deal. But, as to your other argument, Google is a global company, headquartered in the US. I'm not sure if a majority of its employees are in the US these days. I think you may be misinterpreting the GP as raising a whataboutism-like argument. I think they're saying "Yes, and also" instead of "No, instead". I realize many times bringing up unrelated problems is used to make "No, instead" arguments, but I don't think that's where the GP is going. I think they're applauding Google, and trying to use embarrassment to push for more broad actions on Google's part.
- wonnage 4y ago
- rkagerer 4y agoSorry, does Google normally bar their employees from relocating at will anyway?
- stjohnswarts 4y agoWell this is available upon request, before you'd obviously have to go through channels for transfer. This is a 100% get out of jail free card due to women's rights violations currently legalized in Texas (and other backward states). I don't really like google, but this is a commendable move on their part to get women and families out of an oppressive zone.
- ksd482 4y agoUsually it's a long process to relocate. They may be stating that they are willing to approve it for anyone who wants to relocate while at the same time making the process easy for them.
- landemva 4y agoI'm getting the popcorn ready for when a person who was born male asks Google for permission to relocate to a State where this service for females is allowed. The more that companies get involved in politics, the more this turns in to clown world.
- anon9001 4y agoThis is the n'th tech company today that's made an announcement similar to this. Even Disney is going to transport workers to abortion-legal states as needed as "health benefit". It's certainly a perk and good on Google for this one, but we're headed to a dark place if your best shot at human rights is to retain employment by a big tech company.
- imdan 4y agoWe're headed to a dark place.
- rybosome 4y agoIt’s happening. I think it’s going to get way worse than most people believe.
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- bogota 4y agoYep. They have already started talking about reversing marriage rights and contraception as well. It’s funny that an unelected body is now going to destroy the US and revert things that are clearly the majority opinion of the population. Im glad I have dual citizenship because It does feel like the next 4 years is going to be a very sharp downturn (socially) in the US.
- lamontcg 4y agoProbably kiss the Affordable Care Act goodbye and head back to the dark ages of losing your insurance and having a preexisting condition means that you get denied treatment. People keep focusing on what this all means to minorities, but if you're just an old white male and sick they'll let you die, too. Cue the old Niemoller poem.
- blindmute 4y agoIf it's the majority opinion it should have no problem being passed in federal or state legislature
- RaymondDeWitt 4y agoDoes this policy apply only to women?
- 31835843 4y ago>To support Googlers and their dependents, our US benefits plan and health insurance covers out-of-state medical procedures that are not available where an employee lives and works. Googlers can also apply for relocation without justification, and those overseeing this process will be aware of the situation. If you need additional support, please connect 1:1 with a People Consultant via [link to internal tool redacted].
- stickyricky 4y agoGoogle should let their employees work wherever they want. Why constrain people. Just go remote.
- humanrebar 4y agoUnpopular opinion here, but I'm pro-life and am considering moving to full remote to get out of states that allow unrestricted late term abortions. In my view, systemic killing of unborn people [1] is up there with slavery and Jim Crow in the worst parts of American history and culture. I have Quaker culture in my family going way back. It'd be nice to be able to vote with my feet on some of these things. If course, most large employers are also overtly against this new decision and doing things like directly funding abortions, so now I have that whole aspect to consider. Maybe we can work on making it easier for small and medium sized business to offer interstate remote work arrangements? Seems like megacorps have an unfair advantage in dealing with the red tape hiring employees who reside in N different states. [1] Yes, reasonable people can disagree about when personhood is viable. And yes, I support bodily autonomy when other people aren't involved, including most drug legalization, etc.
- heleninboodler 4y ago> I'm pro-life and am considering moving to full remote to get out of states that allow unrestricted late term abortions. Are you worried you'll accidentally have an abortion if you live where it's legal? Or do you just prefer to be physically farther away when other people do it?
- xiphias2 4y agoIn principle I would feel the same as you, but if one looks at the science of the development of human fetus versus what we, the humanity do with animals with completely developed nervous systems, I believe that what we're doing to animals for meat production is uncomparably worse. At the same time easy abortion makes hookup culture more prevalent which can lead to other problems with societies.
- 4y ago
- godmode2019 4y agoWhat if, after reviewing their internal HR data they found woman employees who have had children have longer retention and higher productivity and work longer hours. Abortion rights might be good for business.
- mullingitover 4y agoThis is a good PR move to get out ahead of the investigative journalists who will absolutely start digging into public campaign contribution data and pointing out how much they’ve donated to the politicians who drove this decision.
- neoyagami 4y agoIsnt this contraproductive? This means less voters who may in a furure overturn this
- betwixthewires 4y agoI don't think most people want to live in a place where they don't like the laws in a moonshot bid to take over the world for ideological reasons.
- roenxi 4y agoFrankly, this is a good stance but doesn't go far enough. Google should have a policy encouraging every employee to relocate to the area they feel most appeals to their values, lifestyle and beliefs. Abortion is an important issue but hardly the only one.
- narrator 4y agoThe migration pattern in the nation seems to be: 1. Going to your super cool tech job in California when you get out of college. 2. After that, you get older and want to buy a house and settle down, and not pay state income tax, and so you move out to a red state to work remote and turn it blue with all the love of diversity picked up in California. Strict abortion laws might serve as somewhat of a barrier to this sort of cultural re-diffusion.
- ryandrake 4y agoOn the other hand, a lot of these "red states" are really hostile to Californians moving in, too. We're low-key looking to move now that remote work is a thing, and I have direct knowledge of communities that overtly don't want political progressives moving in. One home seller's agent brought up that the seller is demanding what they called a "California Tax." The asking price is what it is, but if the buyer is from California, they want 20% more. And it's not because they think we are all rich and can afford it. These places just don't want us around.
- karmasimida 4y agoClearly some of the red states residents have fundamentally different idea on many things from mine. And the divide is huge. I joked about how woke CA and hate high taxes, but I don't want my life managed by head elected by religious believers/idealogues. The answer is NO
- cbozeman 4y ago> and turn it blue with all the love of diversity picked up in California. No thanks. Stay in California, please. I like Texas as it is. Texas will likely, eventually, end up passing some sort of abortion laws similar to what European nations have - no abortions after 12 weeks, abortions in case of incest / rape, etc. Frankly, I'd prefer to see Congress get off their ass and do their job and work together on federal abortion laws, since that's... you know... their goddamn fucking job... to pass laws... but we all know it'll never happen because Nancy Pelosi can cry to her ultra-liberal base that, "We TRIED sooooo hard, but the mean ol' Republicans won't let us abort babies 7 seconds before they're born!" and Mitch McConnell can cry to his ultra-conservative base that, "We wanted to meet those baby killers halfway, but they want to abort babies when they're still 16-cell zygotes! Godless heathens!" And then we end up right back to where we are now, with states deciding... all because we have Congressional leadership and members who are so cowardly they don't understand that their job isn't to get re-elected, it's to pass laws beneficial to the entire nation, with which, the entire nation can live.
- notacoward 4y agoBut will Google - or any of the others - pledge not to support record keeping or data mining aimed at the prosecution of those who seek abortions? Any changes to their privacy rules or app store policies? While it's nice that they offer travel/relocation benefits, the cost to them is down in the noise relative to their total budgets. Turning away or alienating government (and shadow-government) customers by refusing to aid them in their march toward Gilead would show more real commitment.
- dillondoyle 4y agoSuch a scary thing this is even a concern.
- Thorentis 4y ago
- WrtCdEvrydy 4y agoIt's not a baby, it's a clump of cells just like the many most people shell or push out of their penis after a good wank.
- proc0 4y agoWe're all literally a clump of cells. Sperm doesn't grow into humans on their own. It boils down to personhood, and whether fetuses and embryos are people. On a base gut feeling, I think fetuses and embryos deserve human rights as well.
- Thorentis 4y agoWhy does its location change whether it is a clump of cells?
- Matheus28 4y agoIt doesn't
- nikolqy 4y agoLiterally. It's batsh*t crazy. Don't worry though, the favorability of these partisan companies are at the lowest they've ever been. These companies will learn the hard way and it's gonna be so much fun to watch. It's just a matter of time before better alternatives come out and destroy these companies. As soon as there's true alternatives, people will switch.
- dillondoyle 4y agoCan't wait to spend my ad dollars on Parler! /ffs
- 4y ago
- yread 4y agoIt sucks to be poor in the US a bit more than yesterday
- mmcnl 4y agoThis is not good news at all. Access to basic healthcare should be a constitutional right. This only increases the power of mega corps.
- drcongo 4y agoI can't stand Google, but hats off to them for this.
- blindmute 4y agoThis is exactly how things should work. If you don't like the politics of one state, you should move to another state. States should retain authority over their laws not enumerated in the constitution. The diversity of states, some with weed, some with no income tax, some with abortion, some with an oil stipend, is a great thing. Hopefully most companies end up supporting this
- RickJWagner 4y agoA small reversal of the outflow from California to Texas, maybe?