Google to pay million dollar compensation to Turkish woman engineer

A court in the United States (US) found in favor of Ulku Rowe, a Turkish female engineer who sued the technology giant Google for alleged gender discrimination.

Rowe took Google to court, claiming that Google had offered to hire her in a lower position solely because of her gender, that she was paid less than men doing similar work, and that she was prevented from being promoted within the company.

During the hearing, which lasted about a week, Google officials argued that the allegations did not reflect the truth and that Rowe had the same rights and was subjected to the same performance criteria as male employees in the company.

GOOGLE TO PAY 1 MILLION DOLLARS

The court found in favor of the Turkish executive and ordered Google to pay 1.15 million dollars in damages to Ülkü Rowe for unpaid wages and the psychological damage she suffered in the process. It also emphasized that Rowe had not proved that Google paid her less than at least two men.

"This unanimous decision not only confirms Mrs Rowe's allegations of mistreatment by Google but also demonstrates that discrimination is not tolerated in the workplace,” Rowe’s lawyer Cara Greene said.

Ulku Rowe claimed that he was hired at Google at level 8 despite 23 years of work experience, while men who started working at the same time and had less experience started at level 9. Rowe earned 750 thousand dollars a year, while those at level 9 received 1 million dollars.

Source: Bloomberglaw.com