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I'm not disagreeing with the other things you said. But there are a few reasons I believe companies want to keep salary information private: 1. They want to ge

I'm not disagreeing with the other things you said. But there are a few reasons I believe companies want to keep salary information private: 1. They want to get top talent at a cheap price, this is understandable because lets face it all of us want to get the best deal they can. 2. They want to avoid a hostile work environment where people are pissed off because they don't feel Jeff in sales should earn so much. Those are the only two reasons I can think of that can be legitimate.

RodericDay 11y ago
I can't put my finger on it, but the way you parse this situation seems like you're trying as hard as possible to underplay its importance. "Lets face it all of us want to get the best deal"- it's like you're trying to empathize with "the company", and not think too hard about the people it's screwing over. Promoting salary secrecy at the expense of your workers' justified welfare is called exploitation.
- nostrademons 11y ago
  Nothing wrong with empathizing with the company, just as long as you can also empathize with the worker and understand why they might feel like they were screwed over when everybody else is getting paid more for the same work.
- nullrouted 11y ago
  Not really...and I apologize if you think that is my meaning. I guess I look at it from a truly business standpoint and any business wants to acquire an "asset" at the lowest possible cost. Whether that be property, IP, other businesses or employees. It would be kind of foolish for a business to go in an say "sure, we will pay the highest cost" in every transaction they do and will likely lead them to bankruptcy. As a normal worker of course I hope they all pay us great salaries and equal pay for equal work but part of my "job" in the negotiating process is to make sure that happens.
  - stormbrew 11y ago
    > As a normal worker of course I hope they all pay us great salaries and equal pay for equal work but part of my "job" in the negotiating process is to make sure that happens. So why are you arguing for making your own job harder? In what kind of negotiation does one side insist the other keep all the cards so they can play a shitty hand? Not a fair one.
  - enraged_camel 11y ago
    >>Not really...and I apologize if you think that is my meaning. I guess I look at it from a truly business standpoint and any business wants to acquire an "asset" at the lowest possible cost. Whether that be property, IP, other businesses or employees. This is the same type of logic that makes people view Human Resources departments with disdain: viewing people as "resources" as opposed to, you know, people. The fact that you are comparing and equating employees with other types of assets is especially disturbing. A chair doesn't have dreams, feelings, or a family to feed. So it makes sense to get the "best deal" when you're buying one. But humans have those things, and treating them as fairly and humanly as possible should be the priority. This may seem like bad business sense to the uninitiated, but companies who follow this practice tend to have a lot of competitive advantage in the sense of fierce employee loyalty. If people know you're treating them fairly and with respect, they will return the favor.
  - TheOtherHobbes 11y ago
    >I guess I look at it from a truly business standpoint and any business wants to acquire an "asset" at the lowest possible cost. That's not the "truly business standpoint" - that's Stockholm Syndrome. The "truly business standpoint" would be to understand that you are not operating as a charity and it's your responsibility to maximise your benefits. As an individual and not a corporation - assuming you're not a contractor - you can choose to trade off salary vs intangible benefits (culture, etc) vs equity vs free time/side projects. But if you're not valuing yourself realistically, you're giving away value to the employer for no rational economic reason. Landlords and other businesses certainly won't operate as charities, so why should you?
  - kybernetikos 11y ago
Retra 11y ago
Those are understandable reasons, but I wouldn't call them legitimate. Like I can understand why "being angry" sounds like a good justification for punching someone in the face, but I wouldn't call it a legitimate reason. If your employees feel Jeff is making too much money, maybe he is? Or maybe your company is doing a poor job of making it clear what it is that he brings to the table. Besides, you already have a hostile environment when you force employees to keep secrets from each other. (They're certainly not going to be loyal when they are being exploited as a matter of policy. It breed cynicism.)
- nullrouted 11y ago
  I guess you and I just disagree which is okay :) I guess it depends on why you are angry and punched that person in the face, did they spit on you, hit your wife, etc? Your analogy here isn't very good. It isn't an employees job to understand what every other employee does and honestly management trying to justify every salary to every other employee would be a bit ridiculous. Maybe Jeff (or lets say Sarah) has a good salary because they bring in 10x the business as the next best sales person. That is easily quantifiable but lets say Jeff/Sarah brings in only the average income but you can see the growth with their customers. That isn't easily quantifiable and honestly doesn't need to be broadcasted to the whole employee base (especially since employees leave and go to other competitors and would then have a good list to work off of). Employees routinely keep information confidential from each other because it makes sense to do so. This isn't a bad thing like you make it out to be, companies shouldn't be some open society where everyone gets to know each others business.
  - ectoplasm 11y ago
    Well, if it's legitimacy you're after, it's illegal to prevent salary sharing in the US.
  - fleitz 11y ago
    Hahah no one would trade on the stock market if you didn't have an idea of the order book, it's essential that pricing is disclosed so that FMV can be reached. Negotiating your salary with out knowing what everyone else was making is stupid. If you're a star performer the goal is to get everyone making what you're making so you can ask for a raise on top of that. (In companies with huge amounts of cash on hand).
bjourne 11y ago
> 2. They want to avoid a hostile work environment where people are pissed off because they don't feel Jeff in sales should earn so much. I've been in workplaces where everyone know each others salaries. Development shared sql database with the hr department so the "information leakage" was obvious. But nobody cared and it didn't lead to a hostile work environment. I cant say knowing what your coworkers make never leads to hostile work environments. I can only say that I find it illogical that it would (why would it piss you off if someone negotiated a good deal?), have never heard of any work environment becoming hostile because of it or experienced it myself.
- LoSboccacc 11y ago
  meh I worked at places with super strict 'hushing' policies and everyone knew everyone else salary anyway anyway I always treated policies more as suggestion than binding contracts, since I never sign on those.
- jjohn2 11y ago
  I can provide a real-life (tongue-in-cheek) example in which knowing what your coworkers make may lead to a 'hostile' work environment. I work for a state agency in which all our salaries are public record (and made quite available to be searched for on the local newspaper's website). There's two developers in our mixed group, of which I am one. The other makes a moderate amount more than me. However, he is much more senior than me, and to be honest, a better coder too, so it's understandable. My gripe is that I think we're both underpayed and I think we both deserve a healthy raise. I wish he was motivated to ask for one instead of just taking the yearly cost-of-living increases so that I might ask for one myself. And that annoys me greatly sometimes. I have yet to be hostile though. :)
  - polymatter 11y ago
    I'm not sure why you feel you can't push both of you for a raise. Surely having the public record is in your favour because you can point to similar jobs that pay more.
- incepted 11y ago
deleted 11y ago
[deleted]
vladimirralev 11y ago
1. Actually most people just want a "fair respectful share" as opposed to "the best deal they can get". The race to get the best deal emerges from the need not to fall behind the few peers who decided to be greedy (or business-savvy as some like to call it). It goes viral. There are many interesting insights around that in sociology and game theory. Like the playouts of the pirate game https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pirate_game https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pirate_game. 2. Well, yes. And whoever is pissed off just go find another job. This way everybody gets to see who is right and who is wrong and learn to respect each others jobs more. It should be noted that a mismatch in the understanding of ethics is just as bad as salary mismatch. Tech workers are encouraged to share all their knowledge while sales/business keep their knowledge and connections private, which naturally makes them more valuable. For example, there is no such thing as open-source business development or open-source sales leads database. Tech workers kind of made the leap, but in terms of sharing the business people are essentially assholes. There is no right or wrong here, it's just an ethics mismatch.
prof_hobart 11y ago
If it were 2 that was driving it, companies would be equally quiet about grades. If you're annoyed that Jeff in sales is earning so much, you'll probably be equally annoyed that he's two levels higher than you. However, in my experience most companies like to make a big deal about your grade. I know the level of pretty much every person in my office, and whenever anyone gets promoted, they get announced in front of the entire company. The real driver is around option 1. The company doesn't really care whether you know that there's people in other departments or at more senior grades getting better paid than you. They'll just tell you that those people are doing more valuable jobs for the company. What they don't want you to find out is how much that they are prepared to pay other people for doing your job. If you find out that the person they've just hired to do the same job as you is on £10K more because that's what the market is paying now, the company has suddenly got a pretty annoyed member of staff with a pretty good bargaining position.
deleted 11y ago
[deleted]
ChuckMcM 11y ago
I think it is a simpler problem than that. Taking away all emotion, a company has an idea of what they want to pay for what level of performance. The problem is, people come into the company with vary variable amounts of pay. The solution that Google came up with was this, hire people at a rate that would get them into the company, observe their performance for a bit (8 - 12 months), decide where they were on the scale, and then plot an intercept course for them for "Google pay". They have always had two ways to control that, one was your "slotting" if you were over paid relative to your performance they could "down slot" you which effectively froze you out of getting a pay raise over two promotion cycles, and two they could "discount" your calibration value which would decrease your potential bonus and even your RSUs[1]. All had the effect of being able to "dial in" your compensation, post hire, into something they considered appropriate. The only problem with that scheme is getting people to accept it right? Who would take a job at a company where your offer letter didn't accurately reflect how much they were actually going to pay you? It established a minimum amount they were going to pay you (your base salary) which, people whom I knew took pay cuts because hey, 20% bonus target (and everyone told you that "most everyone get all their bonus") and gee that was actually a pay raise right? In the Bay Area when your HR "business partner" started reminding you that California was an "At Will" work state (which means you can quit any time, they can fire you any time), if you were paying attention you got the message to stop pursuing your current line of questioning/activity/what ever. But hey, it's there pool and their rules, that is the way of things. And while you might think it was Wrong, other than some of the stuff that came out in Brian Reed's case I don't think they did anything regularly that was illegal. Just optimizing to the a different set of constraints than you might expect. [1] "Restricted Stock Units" or RSUs would vest based on your 'score' with a max of 1.0 Google Shares to RSUs and a minimum of 0 Google Shares to an RSU.

RodericDay 11y ago

I can't put my finger on it, but the way you parse this situation seems like you're trying as hard as possible to underplay its importance. "Lets face it all of us want to get the best deal"- it's like you're trying to empathize with "the company", and not think too hard about the people it's screwing over. Promoting salary secrecy at the expense of your workers' justified welfare is called exploitation.

nostrademons 11y ago
Nothing wrong with empathizing with the company, just as long as you can also empathize with the worker and understand why they might feel like they were screwed over when everybody else is getting paid more for the same work.
nullrouted 11y ago
Not really...and I apologize if you think that is my meaning. I guess I look at it from a truly business standpoint and any business wants to acquire an "asset" at the lowest possible cost. Whether that be property, IP, other businesses or employees. It would be kind of foolish for a business to go in an say "sure, we will pay the highest cost" in every transaction they do and will likely lead them to bankruptcy. As a normal worker of course I hope they all pay us great salaries and equal pay for equal work but part of my "job" in the negotiating process is to make sure that happens.
- stormbrew 11y ago
  > As a normal worker of course I hope they all pay us great salaries and equal pay for equal work but part of my "job" in the negotiating process is to make sure that happens. So why are you arguing for making your own job harder? In what kind of negotiation does one side insist the other keep all the cards so they can play a shitty hand? Not a fair one.
- enraged_camel 11y ago
  >>Not really...and I apologize if you think that is my meaning. I guess I look at it from a truly business standpoint and any business wants to acquire an "asset" at the lowest possible cost. Whether that be property, IP, other businesses or employees. This is the same type of logic that makes people view Human Resources departments with disdain: viewing people as "resources" as opposed to, you know, people. The fact that you are comparing and equating employees with other types of assets is especially disturbing. A chair doesn't have dreams, feelings, or a family to feed. So it makes sense to get the "best deal" when you're buying one. But humans have those things, and treating them as fairly and humanly as possible should be the priority. This may seem like bad business sense to the uninitiated, but companies who follow this practice tend to have a lot of competitive advantage in the sense of fierce employee loyalty. If people know you're treating them fairly and with respect, they will return the favor.
- TheOtherHobbes 11y ago
  >I guess I look at it from a truly business standpoint and any business wants to acquire an "asset" at the lowest possible cost. That's not the "truly business standpoint" - that's Stockholm Syndrome. The "truly business standpoint" would be to understand that you are not operating as a charity and it's your responsibility to maximise your benefits. As an individual and not a corporation - assuming you're not a contractor - you can choose to trade off salary vs intangible benefits (culture, etc) vs equity vs free time/side projects. But if you're not valuing yourself realistically, you're giving away value to the employer for no rational economic reason. Landlords and other businesses certainly won't operate as charities, so why should you?
- kybernetikos 11y ago

Retra 11y ago

Those are understandable reasons, but I wouldn't call them legitimate. Like I can understand why "being angry" sounds like a good justification for punching someone in the face, but I wouldn't call it a legitimate reason. If your employees feel Jeff is making too much money, maybe he is? Or maybe your company is doing a poor job of making it clear what it is that he brings to the table. Besides, you already have a hostile environment when you force employees to keep secrets from each other. (They're certainly not going to be loyal when they are being exploited as a matter of policy. It breed cynicism.)

nullrouted 11y ago
I guess you and I just disagree which is okay :) I guess it depends on why you are angry and punched that person in the face, did they spit on you, hit your wife, etc? Your analogy here isn't very good. It isn't an employees job to understand what every other employee does and honestly management trying to justify every salary to every other employee would be a bit ridiculous. Maybe Jeff (or lets say Sarah) has a good salary because they bring in 10x the business as the next best sales person. That is easily quantifiable but lets say Jeff/Sarah brings in only the average income but you can see the growth with their customers. That isn't easily quantifiable and honestly doesn't need to be broadcasted to the whole employee base (especially since employees leave and go to other competitors and would then have a good list to work off of). Employees routinely keep information confidential from each other because it makes sense to do so. This isn't a bad thing like you make it out to be, companies shouldn't be some open society where everyone gets to know each others business.
- ectoplasm 11y ago
  Well, if it's legitimacy you're after, it's illegal to prevent salary sharing in the US.
- fleitz 11y ago
  Hahah no one would trade on the stock market if you didn't have an idea of the order book, it's essential that pricing is disclosed so that FMV can be reached. Negotiating your salary with out knowing what everyone else was making is stupid. If you're a star performer the goal is to get everyone making what you're making so you can ask for a raise on top of that. (In companies with huge amounts of cash on hand).

bjourne 11y ago

> 2. They want to avoid a hostile work environment where people are pissed off because they don't feel Jeff in sales should earn so much. I've been in workplaces where everyone know each others salaries. Development shared sql database with the hr department so the "information leakage" was obvious. But nobody cared and it didn't lead to a hostile work environment. I cant say knowing what your coworkers make never leads to hostile work environments. I can only say that I find it illogical that it would (why would it piss you off if someone negotiated a good deal?), have never heard of any work environment becoming hostile because of it or experienced it myself.

LoSboccacc 11y ago
meh I worked at places with super strict 'hushing' policies and everyone knew everyone else salary anyway anyway I always treated policies more as suggestion than binding contracts, since I never sign on those.
jjohn2 11y ago
I can provide a real-life (tongue-in-cheek) example in which knowing what your coworkers make may lead to a 'hostile' work environment. I work for a state agency in which all our salaries are public record (and made quite available to be searched for on the local newspaper's website). There's two developers in our mixed group, of which I am one. The other makes a moderate amount more than me. However, he is much more senior than me, and to be honest, a better coder too, so it's understandable. My gripe is that I think we're both underpayed and I think we both deserve a healthy raise. I wish he was motivated to ask for one instead of just taking the yearly cost-of-living increases so that I might ask for one myself. And that annoys me greatly sometimes. I have yet to be hostile though. :)
- polymatter 11y ago
  I'm not sure why you feel you can't push both of you for a raise. Surely having the public record is in your favour because you can point to similar jobs that pay more.
incepted 11y ago

deleted 11y ago

[deleted]

vladimirralev 11y ago

1. Actually most people just want a "fair respectful share" as opposed to "the best deal they can get". The race to get the best deal emerges from the need not to fall behind the few peers who decided to be greedy (or business-savvy as some like to call it). It goes viral. There are many interesting insights around that in sociology and game theory. Like the playouts of the pirate game https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pirate_game https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pirate_game. 2. Well, yes. And whoever is pissed off just go find another job. This way everybody gets to see who is right and who is wrong and learn to respect each others jobs more. It should be noted that a mismatch in the understanding of ethics is just as bad as salary mismatch. Tech workers are encouraged to share all their knowledge while sales/business keep their knowledge and connections private, which naturally makes them more valuable. For example, there is no such thing as open-source business development or open-source sales leads database. Tech workers kind of made the leap, but in terms of sharing the business people are essentially assholes. There is no right or wrong here, it's just an ethics mismatch.

prof_hobart 11y ago

If it were 2 that was driving it, companies would be equally quiet about grades. If you're annoyed that Jeff in sales is earning so much, you'll probably be equally annoyed that he's two levels higher than you. However, in my experience most companies like to make a big deal about your grade. I know the level of pretty much every person in my office, and whenever anyone gets promoted, they get announced in front of the entire company. The real driver is around option 1. The company doesn't really care whether you know that there's people in other departments or at more senior grades getting better paid than you. They'll just tell you that those people are doing more valuable jobs for the company. What they don't want you to find out is how much that they are prepared to pay other people for doing your job. If you find out that the person they've just hired to do the same job as you is on £10K more because that's what the market is paying now, the company has suddenly got a pretty annoyed member of staff with a pretty good bargaining position.

deleted 11y ago

[deleted]

ChuckMcM 11y ago

I think it is a simpler problem than that. Taking away all emotion, a company has an idea of what they want to pay for what level of performance. The problem is, people come into the company with vary variable amounts of pay. The solution that Google came up with was this, hire people at a rate that would get them into the company, observe their performance for a bit (8 - 12 months), decide where they were on the scale, and then plot an intercept course for them for "Google pay". They have always had two ways to control that, one was your "slotting" if you were over paid relative to your performance they could "down slot" you which effectively froze you out of getting a pay raise over two promotion cycles, and two they could "discount" your calibration value which would decrease your potential bonus and even your RSUs[1]. All had the effect of being able to "dial in" your compensation, post hire, into something they considered appropriate. The only problem with that scheme is getting people to accept it right? Who would take a job at a company where your offer letter didn't accurately reflect how much they were actually going to pay you? It established a minimum amount they were going to pay you (your base salary) which, people whom I knew took pay cuts because hey, 20% bonus target (and everyone told you that "most everyone get all their bonus") and gee that was actually a pay raise right? In the Bay Area when your HR "business partner" started reminding you that California was an "At Will" work state (which means you can quit any time, they can fire you any time), if you were paying attention you got the message to stop pursuing your current line of questioning/activity/what ever. But hey, it's there pool and their rules, that is the way of things. And while you might think it was Wrong, other than some of the stuff that came out in Brian Reed's case I don't think they did anything regularly that was illegal. Just optimizing to the a different set of constraints than you might expect. [1] "Restricted Stock Units" or RSUs would vest based on your 'score' with a max of 1.0 Google Shares to RSUs and a minimum of 0 Google Shares to an RSU.