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In Norway, everyone can know how much you earn [video]

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Re: In Norway, everyone can know how much you earn [video]

#11
post #10

It's the same in Finland. Tax rates are fairly easy to discover for anyone. And based off that you can get a very good idea of their earnings. In practice I've never met or spoken to anyone who has gone out their way to do this. It's normally just the tabloids outing the salaries of politicians and celebrities once a year.

One recruiter said that he'll find out my salary from my tax return when I said I didn't want to disclose it to him. By the way, I think the actual income is public knowledge, not the tax rate.

Pretty bad recruiter by the sounds of it. I've never been asked my current salary. Only expected salary.

I expect he/she was calling got bluff.

Re: In Norway, everyone can know how much you earn [video]

#12
post #9
post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If I had access to such information, I would immediately try to figure out how much my colleagues and peers in other groups/companies are making. Knowing how much other people are making for similar job functions, gives you huge negotiating power in managing your career. It's a net win for all workers in society.

You can't look up other peoples' tax anonymously in Norway though since 2013. Your person of interest gets an automatic notification.

Pay some random guy to do it for you?

Re: In Norway, everyone can know how much you earn [video]

#14
post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One recruiter said that he'll find out my salary from my tax return when I said I didn't want to disclose it to him. By the way, I think the actual income is public knowledge, not the tax rate.

Pretty bad recruiter by the sounds of it. I've never been asked my current salary. Only expected salary. I expect he/she was calling got bluff.

It's actually one if those signals that the company is no good.

Re: In Norway, everyone can know how much you earn [video]

#15
post #7

It's the same in Finland. Tax rates are fairly easy to discover for anyone. And based off that you can get a very good idea of their earnings. In practice I've never met or spoken to anyone who has gone out their way to do this. It's normally just the tabloids outing the salaries of politicians and celebrities once a year.

If I had access to such information, I would immediately try to figure out how much my colleagues and peers in other groups/companies are making. Knowing how much other people are making for similar job functions, gives you huge negotiating power in managing your career. It's a net win for all workers in society.

Have you considered the alternative approach of talking to people? A lot less creepy than cyber stalking their tax reports.

Re: In Norway, everyone can know how much you earn [video]

#17
Italy did the same in 2008, publishing a list with 2005 tax returns info, causing public uproars. The list was then removed (and never been published again) after the Italian Data Protection Authority ruled it infringed citizens' privacy.

Needless to say, the data is still available through P2P networks: https://torrentproject.se/?t=redditi+2005

Re: In Norway, everyone can know how much you earn [video]

#18
It works like that here in Sweden as well.

Fun story: in my teenage years, when dating my high school sweetheart, I went to visit her grandparents house for the first time.

Arriving at their house, the grandmother quickly pulls out her Taxeringskalender (taxation calendar - a paperback where a company has collected all this public information, and they sell it as a handy book). She begins to look up my surname and tells me how much my parents earn.

After having lived abroad (Japan, Germany and the UK) I've realized the Scandinavian system is weird at times, but they (or we) do their thing and everyone is kind of aiming at the same goal in society. Extreme transparency, and many striving for equality above all.

Re: In Norway, everyone can know how much you earn [video]

#19
post #6
post #5

I must be naive but I thought this was public information in most countries.

Would you mind saying which country you live in? I'm from the UK, where income/tax is private, and my understanding is that this is the same in the USA, and most European countries. It's interesting that what's "normal" to me is so alien and unexpected to other people.

I think it's common in Scandinavia, and when moving out of the peninsula for the first time I was chocked that it wasn't like that for everyone. Now I feel queasy about having that data public.

Re: In Norway, everyone can know how much you earn [video]

#20
post #18

It works like that here in Sweden as well. Fun story: in my teenage years, when dating my high school sweetheart, I went to visit her grandparents house for the first time. Arriving at their house, the grandmother quickly pulls out her Taxeringskalender (taxation calendar - a paperback where a company has collected all this public information, and they sell it as a handy book). She begins to look up my surname and te…

That's just weird. Social rule number one: don't look up somebody in the Taxeringskalender when they are in the same room.
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