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> You could say the takeaway is don't work for companies out to screw their workers, but that's most of them. Seems like this is something transparent salary p

> You could say the takeaway is don't work for companies out to screw their workers, but that's most of them. Seems like this is something transparent salary policies might change.

hx87 10y ago
Exactly--open salaries might cause some companies to crash and burn, but these are companies that /should/ crash and burn.
- jjnoakes 10y ago
  I'm not arguing one way or the other about open salaries, but should a company really crash and burn for hiring someone who was willing to work for some price $X, even if it is lower than their peer? I mean the person did accept the job knowing $X, right?
  - edoceo 10y ago
    Yes. And then more data becomes available, which changes perspective. Then employees leave for better opportunity
    - jjnoakes 10y ago
      No disagreement here; I just don't know how "companies might crash and burn because they pay their employees lower than market rate" equates to "companies that pay their employees lower than market rate should crash and burn". One doesn't follow from the other, and I don't agree that there's inherent evil just because the salary was lower than elsewhere.
      - ozzy6009 10y ago
        It doesn't, what he is saying is that the companies that do crash and burn after revealing salary information to their employees are the ones that should crash and burn. There is not an inherent evil in paying a lower salary. On the other hand,if the only reason they are able to pay a lower salary is because their employees do not know any better, they are more likely to be negatively affected by opening their salary information.
      - jungturk 10y ago
        I didn't read it as a moral judgement. The important characteristics of the companies he's talking about is that they're in an unstable equilibrium dependent on wage ignorance. Meaning that wage info itself would destabilize them rather than any of the mentioned toxicity. I think he's excluded "companies that underpay but are stable in the presence of wage info" from the class that "should [be expected to] crash and burn".
  - hx87 10y ago
    If the "willing to work for $X" was based on flawed or incomplete information, and X would be higher if more complete information was accessible, then yes, I would say they should crash and burn. OTOH, if two people with access to the same information were willing to work for different salaries, that would be fine. IMO, information asymmetry that is enforced and not the result of research costs is a form of rent-seeking and should be abolished.
  - Retra 10y ago
    If that were true, these companies would have no reason to fear opening up. After all, each of their employees made conscious decisions to be underpaid, so why would they leave?
    - user5994461 10y ago
      No they didn't. Most likely their employees have no clue what they could get elsewhere, or they better take that job here first than wait 2 months for another offer elsewhere, or they needed to be in city X before moving to a better company, or... Random number: 50% of employees consider their employment as a stepping stone.
      - Retra 10y ago
        That's my point. "the person did accept the job knowing $X, right?" is not a valid assumption.
  - eloisant 10y ago
    That's a bad move on the part of the company, because an underpaid person is a time-bomb. From what I've seen, the problem often arise not with people hired at a low pay because they didn't know better, but hired at a low pay because that was the market price at the time. They end up having less pay than people with the same experience (or even less) who were hired later when the market salary was higher.
    - jjnoakes 10y ago
      > an underpaid person is a time-bomb I disagree. There may be some instances of this, but there are also instances of people who love their job and would not change it for more money. Money isn't the only motivator.
      - Chris2048 10y ago
        Love their job, or love their role?
  - cmdkeen 10y ago
    From some of the management training I've sat through money is a poor motivator but a really powerful demotivator. If I give you a pay rise you very quickly come to see yourself as "worth" that amount of money and so any boost is short lived. If you feel that you are underpaid that leads to a long running and very powerful effect as described above. There are plenty of other things that are much more powerful motivators than money, and a good company to work for is probably not the one paying you the most. Otherwise everyone would be in finance working 100 hour weeks and loving it. The issue isn't that someone was paid $X is that they felt they were worth $Y and the other incentives and motivators weren't sufficient to overcome that. If they were paid less than they could command elsewhere but doing work that mattered to them and challenged them, felt valued by the company, were part of a good team, had flexibility in work life balance, were given opportunities to develop and learn, had prospects for advancement and the myriad other things that different people value (and sometimes value very differently) then the situation may have been very different.
- IshKebab 10y ago
  Which is exactly why it won't catch on.

> You could say the takeaway is don't work for companies out to screw their workers, but that's most of them. Seems like this is something transparent salary policies might change.

hx87 10y ago

Exactly--open salaries might cause some companies to crash and burn, but these are companies that /should/ crash and burn.

jjnoakes 10y ago
I'm not arguing one way or the other about open salaries, but should a company really crash and burn for hiring someone who was willing to work for some price $X, even if it is lower than their peer? I mean the person did accept the job knowing $X, right?
- edoceo 10y ago
  Yes. And then more data becomes available, which changes perspective. Then employees leave for better opportunity
  - jjnoakes 10y ago
    No disagreement here; I just don't know how "companies might crash and burn because they pay their employees lower than market rate" equates to "companies that pay their employees lower than market rate should crash and burn". One doesn't follow from the other, and I don't agree that there's inherent evil just because the salary was lower than elsewhere.
    - ozzy6009 10y ago
      It doesn't, what he is saying is that the companies that do crash and burn after revealing salary information to their employees are the ones that should crash and burn. There is not an inherent evil in paying a lower salary. On the other hand,if the only reason they are able to pay a lower salary is because their employees do not know any better, they are more likely to be negatively affected by opening their salary information.
    - jungturk 10y ago
      I didn't read it as a moral judgement. The important characteristics of the companies he's talking about is that they're in an unstable equilibrium dependent on wage ignorance. Meaning that wage info itself would destabilize them rather than any of the mentioned toxicity. I think he's excluded "companies that underpay but are stable in the presence of wage info" from the class that "should [be expected to] crash and burn".
- hx87 10y ago
  If the "willing to work for $X" was based on flawed or incomplete information, and X would be higher if more complete information was accessible, then yes, I would say they should crash and burn. OTOH, if two people with access to the same information were willing to work for different salaries, that would be fine. IMO, information asymmetry that is enforced and not the result of research costs is a form of rent-seeking and should be abolished.
- Retra 10y ago
  If that were true, these companies would have no reason to fear opening up. After all, each of their employees made conscious decisions to be underpaid, so why would they leave?
  - user5994461 10y ago
    No they didn't. Most likely their employees have no clue what they could get elsewhere, or they better take that job here first than wait 2 months for another offer elsewhere, or they needed to be in city X before moving to a better company, or... Random number: 50% of employees consider their employment as a stepping stone.
    - Retra 10y ago
      That's my point. "the person did accept the job knowing $X, right?" is not a valid assumption.
- eloisant 10y ago
  That's a bad move on the part of the company, because an underpaid person is a time-bomb. From what I've seen, the problem often arise not with people hired at a low pay because they didn't know better, but hired at a low pay because that was the market price at the time. They end up having less pay than people with the same experience (or even less) who were hired later when the market salary was higher.
  - jjnoakes 10y ago
    > an underpaid person is a time-bomb I disagree. There may be some instances of this, but there are also instances of people who love their job and would not change it for more money. Money isn't the only motivator.
    - Chris2048 10y ago
      Love their job, or love their role?
- cmdkeen 10y ago
  From some of the management training I've sat through money is a poor motivator but a really powerful demotivator. If I give you a pay rise you very quickly come to see yourself as "worth" that amount of money and so any boost is short lived. If you feel that you are underpaid that leads to a long running and very powerful effect as described above. There are plenty of other things that are much more powerful motivators than money, and a good company to work for is probably not the one paying you the most. Otherwise everyone would be in finance working 100 hour weeks and loving it. The issue isn't that someone was paid $X is that they felt they were worth $Y and the other incentives and motivators weren't sufficient to overcome that. If they were paid less than they could command elsewhere but doing work that mattered to them and challenged them, felt valued by the company, were part of a good team, had flexibility in work life balance, were given opportunities to develop and learn, had prospects for advancement and the myriad other things that different people value (and sometimes value very differently) then the situation may have been very different.
IshKebab 10y ago
Which is exactly why it won't catch on.