Google should not have a two-tiered health system at the expense of its Black vendors, contractors, and temporary workers. Google made headlines this week for the high-tech rapid COVID-19 tests they gave their employees. However, the Alphabet Workers Union, formed to influence worker-powered change at Google’s parent company Alphabet, Inc., has revealed that these instant-result tests are exclusively for the privileged few: full-time Google employees, including those who exclusively work from home. 

Google offering their employees high-tech rapid COVID tests wouldn’t be a problem, except these new tests are not available to their temporary employees, vendors, or contract workers, many of whom risk COVID infection every day just by going to work. The most egregious part? Despite low diversity rates amongst its full-time staff, a disproportionate number of Google’s temporary employees, vendors, and contract workers are Black. 

Google has relied on a two-tiered employment system for years to bolster their record profits, in which contractors, vendors, and temporary workers are underpaid and treated as second-class citizens by the company – with contractors even having different colored badges to signal their status. Only full-time workers are deemed deserving of Google’s many perks like competitive pay, holiday parties, stock options, and premium healthcare plans.

Google’s two-tiered health system is a continuation of their mistreatment of contract workers and is just another way Google harms its Black workers. Google has a responsibility to provide equal access to COVID-19 testing for all its employees, not just those working full-time in cubicles and corner offices.

Here is the Petition:

Sundar Pichai,

Google must make high-tech rapid COVID tests available to all its employees, not just your full-time workers. These new tests are not available to your temporary employees, vendors, or contract workers, a disproportionate number of whom are Black and risk COVID infection every day just by going to work. 

Google’s two-tiered health system mirrors the racist realities of our healthcare system, a system that results in disparate health outcomes for Black communities. Amidst a global pandemic, these health inequities are only more stark; since the release of the CDC’s new isolation guidance, COVID-19 has infected and killed Black people at disproportionate rates.

Google should not have a two-tiered health system at the expense of its Black vendors, contractors, and temporary workers. We demand that Google act as a corporate leader and provide equal access to COVID-19 testing for all your employees, not just those working in cubicles and corner offices.