Google Denies Pay Raise Despite Inflation: How Much Does a Google Employee Earn?

Despite the rising inflation, employees at tech giant Google won't get a corresponding pay increase.

While Google management recognizes the need for its workforce to have a higher pay amid rising prices of commodities, the company has no plans for a company-wide salary hike.

Google salaries were addressed during a special meeting on Tuesday that was originally meant for discussions on 2022 strategy, CNBC reported.

Google Salaries Amid Inflation, a Hot Topic During All-Hands Meeting

In these Google all-hands meetings, discussion topics are determined by submissions of questions to an internal forum named Dory. A question about inflation and employee salary received more than 400 "upvotes" and garnered enough interest for its inclusion in the special meeting.

Sources gave CNBC an audio of the meeting that included a copy of the question about the inflation that Google parent firm Alphabet's CEO Sundar Pichai read aloud.

With U.S. inflation hitting seven percent, the question asserted that companies have been "doing blanket salary adjustment" to just cover the inflation. The employee asked if Google has plans to follow suit.

Pichai then called on Google vice president for compensation Frank Wagner to respond. He said that while the company acknowledges the importance of inflation and compensation among the company workforce, Google won't make any salary adjustments to match inflation.

However, Wagner said Google leadership is set to release letters to managers to let employees learn about their compensation awards for next year.

Wagner said as price inflation increases, there are corresponding increases in the cost of labor and market salaries. These, he said, "have been higher than in the recent past," emphasizing that Google's "compensation budgets have reflected that."

The Google executive said that when pay rates go up, the company would not hand out "smaller increments to everybody," but rather "adjust it and pay by performance," referring to the compensation awards.

He reiterated that Google will not make any "across-the-board type adjustment."

How Much Does a Google Employee Earn?

According to Comparably.com, the average estimated annual salary at Google that includes the base pay and bonuses is $133,066 or $63 per hour, and the estimated median pay is $134,386 or $64 per hour. The report indicated that the highest paying job at Google is for a Director of Finance, who receives $600,000 annually, while the lowest is a Receptionist at $37,305 a year.

Average department salaries include human resources at $85,556, legal at $155,410, operations at $83,966, and sales at $187,687. Half of all Google salaries are more than $134,386 annually.

This comes amid the wave of the "Great Resignation," wherein workers around the U.S. leave their jobs to seek better paying ones, better locations or exciting new challenges at work. According to U.S. Department of Labor figures (via CNBC), 4.2 million workers resigned from their jobs in October, down from an all-time high 4.4 million resignations in September. With inflation hitting six percent in October, the highest since 1990, Americans are naturally seeking greener pastures with better paying jobs as they spend more for basic needs such as gas and groceries.

Google parent firm Alphabet, however, stays aloft as among the trillion-dollar companies that continue its dominance of the overall tech scene. Its revenue and stock price have soared in recent years, making it cushion the effects of the pandemic, thus rewarding employees with equity. Advertising revenue climbed 43 percent to $53.1 billion in the third quarter, while stock prices skyrocketed 68 percent in 2021.