High-Ranking Women's Affairs Diplomat Allegedly Paid Nanny Only $3/Hour

Submitted by Mastodon on Tue, 2013-12-17 17:03

Article here. Excerpt:

'A high-ranking Indian diplomat and women’s rights activist is being accused of visa fraud and paying her children’s nanny only $3.31 an hour for five months.

Devyani Khobragade, a 39-year-old mother of two, is the Deputy Consul General at the Indian Consulate in Manhattan. She’s in charge of Political, Economic, Commercial and Women’s Affairs, according to NDTV.

Yet from June until November of this year, Khobragade allegedly paid her family caretaker less than half of New York’s $7.25 minimum wage. She’s also been accused of encouraging the nanny — Indian native Sangeeta Richard — to lie on her U.S. visa application, saying she’d be making $4,500 a month rather than a measly $537.
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They argue that her $4,000 per month salary makes it difficult to pay anything more for childcare. While Khobragade’s alleged actions were totally illegal, her representation does make an interesting point about how far $4,000 goes in NYC. And for a three-person family nonetheless. The average monthly rent for a two-bedroom apartment in Manhattan is $3,923, leaving little room for food and transportation, much less an expensive babysitter.'

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$6355/yr. - that's what the sitter was getting. ($3.31/hr. x 8 hrs. x 5 days x 4 weeks x 12 mos. = 6355)

Agreed, it's hard to make ends meet in Manhattan making only $48k/yr. So if you can't afford to live in NY-- you don't. Even if I ever wanted to live there for some reason, I probably to this day would choose not to, simply because one's spending power is substantially less there than in virtually any other city in the U.S. (except maybe L.A. or parts of San Francisco/"Silicon Valley"). In short, while your job is kewl and prestigious enough, if it doesn't pay enough, you gots ta give it up. But especially as a diplomatic rep of a foreign gov't, one really ought to know better than to fudge critical immigration-related documents. After all, diplomatic machinery is *all about* documents, isn't it? But unless her salary is her only source of income, is she really being completely honest with the media and herself as she claims that the $48k she is getting from her job simply isn't cutting it? How much is Mr. Khobragade bringing in, assuming there is such a person? Wikipedia on Devyani Khobragade makes no mention of her marital or relationship status (and neither it seems do the articles I have found by Googling stuff for this comment), so at the moment, I can't really ASS-U-ME she is splitting expenses with someone else, married or not.

Anyway, apparently, this particular dust-up is making headlines in India; see here. And it's looking uglier and uglier, too, as the maid's husband and child were taken into police custody in India for some reason. Also, apparently Ms. Khobragade's father is a retired Indian IAS official among other things and quite influential. (See here for his reaction to his daughter's arrest). Yep, this one's looking like a real headache for all involved. "...silly human race...", as 'Yes' once sung...

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Submitted by Matt on Wed, 2013-12-18 04:47