Brainlabs, a mathematics, technology and analytics company in the UK, gives its female employees a 8.6% payrise no matter position, skill, work hours or ability to "combat the pay gap". Then justify it be rejecting math and statistics and claiming the refutation of it is "normalization" and a "con"

Machnow · 2016-05-31T04:10:29+00:00

there's so much wrong with this ....it's hard to begin with any one fucked up point made.

here's one: gendered quotas and gendered affirmative action:

"By committing to repeat this exercise next year, we have a serious incentive as a business to fix the problem. This could be as simple as hiring more women into leadership positions or promoting more women."

here's another: Newspeak:

"we have tried to define what is and isn’t acceptable when it comes to language in the company. This is not to say that swearing is banned; it’s more that we do not see this office as a place for comments such as “stop being a girl”.

another one: can't compete? no prob...we'll just eliminate that whole pesky "competetive" thingy:

"My experiences in the workplace have taught me that you can’t fix structural inequality by telling women to “assert themselves more” or to “lean in”. You’ve got to change the unfair system that has failed women in the past and continues to fail women today."

which is in conjunction to more of the same:

"Overly prescriptive job descriptions have been shown to deter women from applying, so we have simplified those. We have removed some of the grey areas around pay and promotion by more clearly defining what we look for in reviews, and by not using stereotypically male characteristics to appraise leadership skills.'

bottom line...don't apply for a job at brainlab....well, not if you have a penis between your legs. if not, you're just the right candidate for them.

TheDude41 · 2016-05-31T05:53:10+00:00

Sexist pigs.

RedBigMan · 2016-05-31T11:07:46+00:00

Well I know which company I'm NOT hiring for math, tech or analytics. Clearly to them feels are more than reals.

Aapje58 · 2016-05-31T09:56:14+00:00

If they really believe that normalization is a con, then do they also pay the same salary to the CEO as to the cleaning person? Do they pay the same salary to a worker who works 20 hours as to one that works 40?

Or are those perfectly valid reasons for pay differences unless men and women make different choices on average?

2016-05-31T04:41:07+00:00

So, we should conclude by the fact you're going to be doing this annually that you've been grossly underpaying your female staff and are now compensating?

In a couple of years, the only men left at that company will be white knights and manginas galore. Run, men, run. No company willing to use a stunt like this that comes at your expense gives a shit about you on any level.

Deansdale · 2016-05-31T09:07:53+00:00

Seeing how they practically admit to discriminating against women up until this point they should be sued. If they didn't, then they are discriminating against men now. It's a lose-lose situation.

Rockbottom503 · 2016-05-31T12:06:09+00:00

Ooh - if I were an employee at brainlabs who had not received the rise based solely on my gender, I'd certainly be considering a discrimation case right about now

2016-05-31T06:15:38+00:00

Id love to see how free market globalized economy deals with inequality.... (doesn't matter against which sex)

Companies with will hire the sex that gets paid less for same quality of work - theyll make fatter profits and out compete the sexist businesses who overpay for same work.

ThePointyBird · 2016-05-31T03:54:36+00:00

I guess they'd know how the math works.

2016-05-31T09:32:00+00:00

how long til they go under?

either they were unlawfully paying their female workers less than their male workers for the same work, or now they're massively overpaying females for menial shit. do they really think they've figured out something google hasn't? STEM roles are largely, or even exclusively male, and tend to have significantly higher wages than non-STEM roles at tech companies. this is not out of some patriarchy trying to keep the wimunz down... it's because receptionists are low skill, low responsibility positions that are easily replaced, are almost exclusively female positions, and will tank the female average. operations positions (accounting, marketing, customer service) are only slightly higher skill, and still not even close to STEM, and to bring up their gender quota, will constitute most of the female workers, bringing down the female wage average. look at google, facebook, or literally any other tech company... STEM is almost exclusively male, and they make up as much of the gender gap as possible in operations/bizdev, and these companies are still 60-70% male.

the only way to get around this is to hire more females in higher comp roles (actual STEM roles). this is such a monumental task, that google turned around and donated $50m to non-profits that engage in teaching women how to code because the gender applicant gap in STEM applicants is utterly gigantic. males in high-comp roles are massively skewing the gender average. the only way they can solve this long term is to either: (1) unlawfully pay women more than men for the exact same work in non-STEM roles, or (2) hire every idiotically unqualified female who applies to STEM roles, and effectively overpay them, or (3) pay significantly below market wages for STEM roles. in 1, paying a woman 8.6% more than a man for the exact same work is by definition, illegal gender discrimination. in 2, any STEM person will be annoyed as fuck to work with these idiots, meaning the company will not only be watering down their STEM quality, they'll actively scare away the good candidates. long term, the average female STEM employee will be, by definition, less qualified, only making people hate working with STEM females more (perpetuating this cycle of stupid). and in 3, they won't be able to compete in the marketplace for STEM candidates.

this just reeks of full stupid. economics always wins.

2016-05-31T13:21:18+00:00

The sexist says that promoting more women is the easiest solution and that giving away free money is the viable alternative. What would also work is employing a bunch of extra men at the lower end of the salary spectrum. They could get a few personal trainers or similar, which would boost the health of the organisation as well as bring down the abitrary figure they seem concerned about.

How quickly they forget that the average is where it is because of the LOW earners. But they are a marketing company, so are just generating publicity. I've boycotted the companies they do work for anyway, I've already saved a couple of hundred £££s since the story broke so I thank them for that.

JestyerAverageJoe · 2016-05-31T13:25:22+00:00

Archive link with better formatting.

IronJohnMRA · 2016-05-31T14:34:27+00:00

I wonder if Brainlabs will give it's male employees a 8.6% sex increase regardless of their position, skill, work hours or ability?

Pornography_saves_li · 2016-06-02T17:31:09+00:00

The male staff resigns en masse in 3...2....1....

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