Wall Street Hypocrisy Exposed: Bank Behind "Fearless Girl" Statue Fined For Systemically Underpaying Women

The bar for Wall Street hypocrisy has just been raised.

In a controversy that can only be described as hilariously ironic, Boston-based bank and asset manager State Street Corp – which famously created and installed the “fearless girl” statue, purportedly symbolizing Wall Street’s progress toward gender equality in the workplace - to be a symbol of Wall Street’s progress toward gender equality, earlier this year - has agreed to pay $5 million to settle claims that it systematically underpaid female and minority employees, according to the New York Post.

State Street assented to the fine – but refused to admit wrongdoing - after being audited by the US Department of Labor’s Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs. The DOL alleges that the firm’s systemic pay discrimination dates back to at least 2010 and affected hundreds of employees, primarily in senior-level positions.

“OFCCP’s analysis demonstrates that a statistically significant disparity in compensation remained even when legitimate factors affecting pay were taken into account,” the Labor Department said Thursday in its filing.

The department alleges that black employees were also discriminated against, with at least 15 individuals being paid less in base salary and total compensation than their “similarly-situated” white peers.

By installing the statue, State Street hoped to kill two birds with one stone: Burnishing its reputation as a female-friendly employer while helping to market its new “SHE” ETF, which invests in female-led companies.

However, the statue was quickly denounced as a transparent marketing ploy, and the bank was roundly criticized by a memorable coalition of feminists, bankers and even the Italian sculptor who created Wall Street’s charging bull. Though that didn’t stop the judges at the Cannes Ad Festival from lavishing McCann, the advertising firm that helped create the statue, with three top awards.

Compounding the irony, State Street used the statue’s installation as an opportunity to tout its efforts to promote more women to senior level positions – a program that was reportedly initiated by CEO Joseph Hooley in 2010 – the same year that the bank began underpaying women, according to the DOL’s complaint.  

For what it’s worth, the bank has denied the allegations.

“State Street is committed to equal pay practices and evaluates on an ongoing basis our internal processes to be sure our compensation, hiring and promotions programs are nondiscriminatory,” a spokesperson said. “While we disagreed with the OFCCP’s analysis and findings, we have cooperated fully with them, and made a decision to bring this six-year-old matter to resolution and move forward.”

The findings from the audit were filed in Boston on Wednesday, along with the settlement agreement.

Twitter users quickly blasted the bank for its hypocrisy and blatant cynicism.

Ironic: the Raging Bull is a piece of guerilla art. Fearless Girl is a marketing ploy by State Street, a company that underpays women. https://t.co/yT9jCyJnUM

— Stanley Pignal (@spignal) October 6, 2017

Couldn’t have said it better ourselves.
 

'A Day Without A Woman' Is The Ultimate In Virtue Signaling Bullshit, And Here's Why

Via JrDeputyAccountant.com,

If you are a woman with the luxury of taking yesterday off, congrats. You aren"t the kind of woman who needs to take a day off to make a point about how women are supposedly underpaid (data is still and will always be out on that one), you are likely protected enough in your position to be able to take a day off in the first place and congratulations, it means you live in the first world where a woman can choose to take a day off for whatever reason. Way to stick it to the man, ladies. I hope you had an awesome day at home, you deserve it.

The triumphant announcement of this day without women on the "official" Women"s March page (because someone bought that dot com, ya know) reads:

In the same spirit of love and liberation that inspired the Women"s March, we join together in making March 8th A Day Without a Woman, recognizing the enormous value that women of all backgrounds add to our socio-economic system--while receiving lower wages and experiencing greater inequities, vulnerability to discrimination, sexual harassment, and job insecurity. We recognize that trans and gender nonconforming people face heightened levels of discrimination, social oppression and political targeting. We believe in gender justice.

Anyone, anywhere, can join by making March 8th A Day Without a Woman, in one or all of the following ways:

• Women take the day off, from paid and unpaid labor


• Avoid shopping for one day (with exceptions for small, women- and minority-owned businesses).


• Wear RED in solidarity with A Day Without A Woman

So even on what is supposed to be our day, we"re being told what to do. Take off work. Don"t shop. Wear RED. BTW, the red thing has already been overdone for AIDS awareness, or are you guys not old enough to remember those AIDS iPods U2 was shilling many many years back?

I own a media company, cobbling together an existence these days but an existence no less, and one that I take great pride in. The fact that I have the opportunity to cobble this existence together is completely first world, I wouldn"t have this option if, say, I were a woman in Sudan. When stories I need to cover come in I can"t be like yeah sorry, it"s wear red day and I"m doing cliche lady stuff at home in the tub sipping wine.

Meanwhile there"s a little girl in Sudan getting her parts hacked up because female genital mutilation is still in a thing around the world and I"m over here in the United States thinking wearing a red shirt makes a difference? Please give me twenty breaks with that shit.

How funny was it they said avoid shopping, like that"s what all we women do right lol. RESIST THE URGE. Don"t shop! That"ll show them! And then turn around the next day and buy a bunch of crap you don"t need on Amazon, that"ll show them. I did go get my hair cut at my women-owned salon but that is beside the God damned point.

If you took yesterday off, good for you. But look the fuck around you. Were you sold into child marriage at 12? Do you still have your natal genitals? Do you have to walk hours a day just for water? No? Then you"re doing pretty good as far as women across the world are concerned. Do we first world women have problems of our own? Of course. But please stop getting the vapors at every opportunity to play up our oppression, it"s getting exhausting.

The fact that y"all can go out there in vagina costumes and not get your asses beat is proof of how just good we have it here in the good ole first world. Remember that when you"re putting on a red shirt the next time.

Female Engineer Sues Tesla For Sexual Harassment

Just days after former Uber engineer Susan Fowler alleged in a viral blogpost that that management and HR dismissed her complaints about documented sexual harassment and sexism, protected a repeat offender because he was a “high performer” and suggested that women in the company were not as skilled as men, another female engineer - this time at Tesla - has accused Elon Musk’s car company of ignoring her complaints of “pervasive harassment”, paying her a lower salary than men doing the same work, promoting less qualified men over her and retaliating against her for raising concerns.

The reason why first the Uber, and now the Tesla allegations will likely shake Silicon Valley to the core, is that if confirmed, this bastion of liberal tolerance may end up being yet another hypocritical myth, with corporate prerogatives and the bottom line driving everything.

The allegations of AJ Vandermeyden, who voiced her complaints to the Guardian, and who still works at the celebrated electric car manufacturer, "paint a picture of a hostile work environment dominated by men where inappropriate sexual behavior is tolerated and women face numerous barriers to advance their careers."

Offering a rare public account of discrimination from a tech worker who remains employed at her company, Vandermeyden said her dedication to Tesla motivated her to advocate for fair treatment and reforms – despite the serious risks she knows she faces for going public.

“Until somebody stands up, nothing is going to change,” she said in a recent interview, her first comments about a discrimination lawsuit she filed last year. “I’m an advocate of Tesla. I really do believe they are doing great things. That said, I can’t turn a blind eye if there’s something fundamentally wrong going on.”

Vandermeyden began at Tesla in 2013 and was eventually promoted to a manufacturing engineering position in the general assembly department, which consisted mostly of men and where she was paid less than male engineers whose work she directly took over, according to her complaint. It was common for her to be the only woman in meetings with 40 to 50 men, she said on a recent morning, seated in the living room of her family’s house in San Carlos, the city where Tesla was founded, located across the bay from its current factory in Fremont.

Another example: Vandermeyden recounted to the Guardian an incident in 2015 when she said a group of roughly 20 men standing on a platform above her and a female colleague began taunting as they walked past. “They all started hooting and hollering and whistling,” she said. “That can’t happen without somebody noticing … It’s disturbing.”

But her objections about sexual harassment and unequal pay only caused her more trouble, according to her complaint. The lawsuit alleges that after she raised concerns in the fall of 2015, management told her that in order to advance her position, she needed to achieve a performance standard in the factory that was unattainable and not expected of male engineers.

There is much more in the full article, but the jist is clear: while there has been a mounting pressure in the Valley to address allegations latent sexism, so far it has been mostly ignored and instead was projected externally, with the idealistic denizens of the rich enclave focusing on "social evils" far away from the California, ideally slamming Trump. Should more such accusers emerge - and they are virtually assured now that the seal has been broken - Silicon Valley may have no choice but to forget the evils of the outside worlds, look inside, and change what some have said is a very hyporcritical corporate culture.