I understand the rationale behind such things, but my feeling tends to be that salary NDAs are basically unfair; they boil down to a way to reward people who ar

I understand the rationale behind such things, but my feeling tends to be that salary NDAs are basically unfair; they boil down to a way to reward people who are better at negotiating. The promise a salary NDA makes is basically "you & I have cooked up an agreement to increase your salary more than those around you, and this NDA will let us avoid the social awkwardness that would otherwise result." (and the implicit message is always "more than", whatever the facts) Meanwhile, of course, you'll always be looking at your colleagues, wondering how much more than you they might be making. Unless you're working in an environment where negotiation is a part of the job, then I don't see why rewarding it makes any sense. Of course, there's nothing to stop your better negotiators going and finding a better deal elsewhere - but I see no reason why "better negotiatiors" equates to "better programmers", and there's always going to be some reason why some of your employees might want to move on.