PAY INEQUITY AT THE NEW YORK TIMES:

NEW YORK – Unionized Black tech workers at The New York Times are paid 26% less than their white counterparts, according to a new study of wages by the Times Tech Guild and The NewsGuild of New York.  

The Times Tech Guild – one of the largest unions of tech workers with collective bargaining rights in the country –  conducted the pay study, reviewing the compensation of its more than 600 members. The union includes software engineers, data analysts, project managers, product managers, and designers at the New York Times and is a bargaining unit of The NewsGuild of New York. 

Among the takeaways:

• Women, who make up 41% of the Tech Guild, earn 12% less on average than men
• Black women and Hispanic or Latina women, who make up just over 6 percent of the Tech Guild, make 33% less than white men in the unit 
• Black workers, who make up 7 percent of the union, earn 26% less than white workers 

The Tech Guild, which won its union election by a landslide in March 2022, is negotiating its first contract. Times management has fought the Tech Guild every step of the way since they first announced their intention to be a union in 2021. 

On Friday, the Tech Guild will again be at the bargaining table and will demand that Times management bridge the pay gap. 

Pay inequity is just part of the picture of what’s happening for these workers at The Times. Members took part in a reply-all email action last month to call out The Times for its use of unjust Performance Improvement Plans. Two-thirds of the people fired by New York Times management have been from underrepresented groups: people of color, women, and/or people with disabilities. Union members on visas had their lives thrown into chaos when unfair firings put their immigration status at risk.

Pay inequity isn’t new at The Times. The Times Guild, which represents nearly 1,500 employees in the newsroom, advertising and other areas of the company, has also taken on pay inequity.

“Every one of our members deserves to be paid equitably,” said Sarah Duncan, a member of the Tech Guild and a Staff Software Engineer for The Times. “We’ve been asking the company to address these disparities for years, and their failure to rectify it adequately is one of the main reasons we formed this union. Just because these pay gaps commonly exist in the tech industry, that doesn't mean it's acceptable. Today we are standing together to demand that the company take pay equity seriously at the bargaining table.”