Google Slashes Salaries of Remote Workers Based on Where They Live
How to earn less at Google? All you need to do is to permanently relocate in remote work mode to some place not too urbanized, it doesn't have to be far from the main office. Thanks to this, your salary could be reduced by up to 25%.
- Google differentiates salaries of employees according to the location from which they provide remote work, not the facility of the company to which they belong.
Google seems to be following the fashion of regulating the prices of many services (e.g. Twitch) depending on where you live, and is differentiating salaries in a similar way. This applies to employees who perform duties remotely. Those who do so from places where less is earned get their pay reduced by up to 25%, as Reuters reports. To calculate the salary, Google uses a tool called Work Location Tool, which is also available to employees. It allows them to see for themselves how their paycheck will change if they move to a particular location.
Making salaries dependent on the standard and cost of living in a particular location is nothing new. As a Google spokesperson told Reuters:
"Our compensation packages have always been determined by location, and we always pay at the top of the local market based on where an employee works from."
One employee, who previously commuted to the New York office from Stamford, reports that after switching to permanent remote working, he was paid 15% less. For the San Francisco area, salary cuts can be as high as 25%.
Google's calculator uses U.S. Census Bureau (CBSA) statistics. According to a spokesperson, a person from, say, a New York City facility who provides work remotely from another location in that city will be paid the same as a full-time employee. According to the CBSA, Stamford is no longer in New York, even though many people commute from there.
Jake Rosenfield, a sociology professor at Washington University in St. Louis, disagrees with Google's conduct:
"What's clear is that Google doesn't have to do this. Google has paid these workers at 100% of their prior wage, by definition. So it's not like they can't afford to pay their workers who choose to work remotely the same that they are used to receiving."
