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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]

#91

Post by gdwatson »

maaaats wrote: post #35
jkot wrote: post #28

Norway has zero transparency when it comes to children rights. Some governments (Slovak, Czech, Romania) recommend not to travel there with children. EDIT: Some explanations. - In Norway social services (Barnevernet) can take children from family without any explanation. - Parents are under gag order, and can not talk about their case. Talking to press means you loose parental rights. - There is no appeal, proof, or…

Is this comment based on the single, recent case that has been severely misrepresented in religious circles?

If the government will not release its claims or what evidence it has for them, how can you be confident the case has been misrepresented?

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

#92

Post by reitanqild »

intothemild wrote: post #85

Here in Oslo I was in a startup where we had a British CEO. He argued about me keeping my pay rise secret. I said there's no such thing. We all know what we earn. It's public. He was shocked. Then next day decided to tell everyone it was a fireable offence to disclose your salary. Which we then said. That the action of making it a fireable offence is actually illegal and a fireable offence. (He quit a number of month…

Norway is crazy but sweet.

Edit: In fact salaries used to be even more public, printed out and left in public for review.

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

#93

Post by keiferski »

The Law of Jante is the description of a pattern of group behaviour towards individuals within Scandinavian communities that negatively portrays and criticises individual success and achievement as unworthy and inappropriate. The Jante Law as a concept was created by the Dano-Norwegian author Aksel Sandemose who, in his novel A Fugitive Crosses His Tracks (En flyktning krysser sitt spor, 1933, English translation published in the USA in 1936), identified the Law of Jante as ten rules. Sandemose's novel portrays the small Danish town Jante (modelled upon his native town Nykøbing Mors as it was at the beginning of the 20th century, but typical of all small towns and communities), where nobody is anonymous.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Law_of_Jante

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

#94

Post by klausjensen »

Svenskunganka wrote: post #26
klausjensen wrote: post #13

When I lived in Norway, I found this to be a pointless violation of my privacy. Still do.

Well, it's a different culture here in Scandinavia. Personally, I couldn't care less if anyone wanted to look up my salary - whether it is a recruiter or someone else. I have my own valuation of my time and skills and if a potential employer can't meet that, there's someone else who will. Having this mindset will help sift out companies that you probably wouldn't want to work for in the first place.

I do not think about it in relation to recruiting at all, in a much broader perspective.

With regards to what I consider to be private information, I just do not think it is the job of the government to publish it.

(I am Scandinavian as well, by the way, although I have chosen to leave - excessive taxation being one on a list of reasons).

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

#95

Post by mchaver »

Kiro wrote: post #49
ACS_Solver wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have the opposite experience, I moved to Scandinavia (Sweden), and this is still one of the weirder things to me. I like the ideas of transparency in general that are prevalent, but I don't see how publishing the tax returns of individual citizens working in the private sector contributes to transparency.

The transparency goes a long way in Sweden. You can call the tax office and say "I want this person and all his relatives' social security numbers, income statements, address history etc etc". They can't question it and you don't need any reason.

Genuinely curious, have there ever been issues of people abusing this? It could possibly be an issue if someone wants to use that information to harass/follow/stalk someone.

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

#96

Post by Broken_Hippo »

kalleboo wrote: post #90
Svenskunganka wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's easy to say that without looking at the countries we're talking about here. The nordic countries are the closest places on earth to "everyone born equally". We all have access to the same education and healthcare, whether our parents have money or not (since it is fully government-funded through taxes).

Not to mention the strength of unions and collective bargaining (maybe not in tech in particular though)

In a way, that goes both ways. In Norway, management is as likely to have a union as the employee. The factory my spouse works at, negotiations are usually done between the unions. A little over half the employees have a union, and from what I understand folks can choose their union. You might have a different work contract than the person standing next to you because of different unions or one having a lack of a union.

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

#97

Post by RodericDay »

wyager wrote: post #77
ginko wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When would that be the case? When you have another job on the side? How is that your employer's business?

>How is that your employer's business? Exactly. That's why public income info is a bad idea.

Public income info means it is much much easier to negotiate against HR.

You know exactly how much x or y makes given a or b. This is info that HR has, because they pay for it. If it was public, you'd have it too.

Your bosses also would not be allowed to guilt-trip you into foregoing a raise without them taking on a comparable part of the burden.

Salary secrecy seems like a quintessentially american thing, completely at odds with faith in markets. If you believe in markets, let the labor markets do the best job they possibly can, by informing agents within them and tearing down information asymmetries.

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

#98

Post by zer0gravity »

charlesdm wrote: post #55
hkjgkjy wrote: 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…

This doesn't sound like a fun story at all, actually. I honestly don't see what kind of good could come from disclosing tax returns publicly..

If you don't have anything to hide, or you don't want to trick people by paying less then the value they produce, then this kind of system is much better because it promotes honesty and a kind of mutual respect. It may seem strange at first but usually democracy and transparency go hand in hand.

Secrets are most of the time the tools of cheaters and liers...

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

#99

Post by jkot »

Broken_Hippo wrote: post #73
jkot wrote: post #28

Norway has zero transparency when it comes to children rights. Some governments (Slovak, Czech, Romania) recommend not to travel there with children. EDIT: Some explanations. - In Norway social services (Barnevernet) can take children from family without any explanation. - Parents are under gag order, and can not talk about their case. Talking to press means you loose parental rights. - There is no appeal, proof, or…

I'm an immigrant in Norway. I do not have children, but have heard the stories. I used to hear some of the same stories in the American system, which also tends to not release details to protect the children. Norway has strict laws about children and children have rights. These laws aren't bent because one is from another culture and living here. For example, physical punishment is pretty common in the US, but it is…

I would recommend you to research this a bit more, if you decide to have a children. Problem are not 'strict laws', but the way there are applied. One single accusation can remove your children, you have no right to even talk to a lawyer and maybe in 6 years you will get some sort of appeal.

Sources are all over internet, Norway is only country with this problem, just google it.

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

#100

Post by digi_owl »

whack wrote: post #7
deanclatworthy wrote: post #2

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.

Keep in mind that at least in Norway it is common that unions do collective bargaining. Never mind that there is no legally mandated minimum salary.

All in all it is a two way street. We are in this together, so we all pull together etc.

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