>As of October 31, 2013, Intuit, Pixar and Lucasfilm have reached a tentative settlement agreement. Pixar and Lucasfilm agreed to pay $9 million in damages, and Intuit agreed to pay $11 million in damages.[9] In May 2014, Judge Lucy Koh approved the $20 million settlement between Lucasfilm, Pixar, and Intuit and their employees. Class members in this settlement, which involved fewer than 8% of the 65,000 employees affected, will receive around $3,840 each.[14]
That's it. Seems so small. That is like a week's worth of pay. It goes to show how class action suits only enrich lawyers, in the end.
I opted out of my check in the settlement. Part of why it was so small is the law firm representing the plaintiffs apparently were more interested in a quick settlement than reasonable compensation. The settlement you quote there wasn't the final one; that was the one rejected as being embarrassingly too small. The final settlement in 2015 was larger, but still very small.
For me it was the personal abuse of trust that really stuck with me. Folks I worked with and respected colluded to keep my wages and the wages of my colleagues low. Illegally. I don't think they ever apologized for it either.
Nothing really. I retained the right to sue for my own personal judgement, which I have not done.
The main thing I got was the satisfaction of writing a letter to the judge pointing out that the attorneys who were representing my class ignored my attempts to communicate with them. I dug up the letter:
To the Court for the High-Tech Employee Antitrust Lawsuit,
I am writing to explain my decision to opt-out of the proposed settlement for the lawsuit against my former employer, Google, and their collusion with other employers. I was a software engineer at Google 2001–2006.
Google, Apple, Adobe and Intel are some of the leading employers in my industry. The harm they did to software engineers, particularly junior ones, is enormous. It’s not simply the lost wages in the settlement period; the market distortion set back the careers of my friends. Artificially lower wages compound for years as new jobs’ salaries often depend on previous ones. Brilliant young engineers lost opportunities to advance their careers because they were unaware of opportunities at other companies. The harm done was significant and I do not feel the settlement is sufficient.
I’m also opting out because I am unimpressed with my nominated attorneys. The fact that Judge Koh ruled the original settlement was “below the range of reasonableness” suggests my attorneys are poor negotiators and have not represented the plaintiffs effectively. I do not see wish to participate in a settlement where they receive $80M+ dollars. Also personally, I’m irritated that they cannot even do class members the courtesy of answering email sent to the published contact address of **@****.com. My emails of April 29 and May 10 both went unacknowledged.
Thank you for reading my letter. I do not wish to speak at the Fairness Hearing.
If you opt into the class settlement, you absolve the defendant of all liability so you can't sue them yourself in the future (for the same issue). If you don't join the class, you can still sue the defendant separate from the class. Not sure if that was the reason for the commenter above opting out, though.
That's it. Seems so small. That is like a week's worth of pay. It goes to show how class action suits only enrich lawyers, in the end.