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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]

#101

Post by jellicle »

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..

Reduces gender discrimination; reduces race discrimination; reduces income inequality; allows employees to make sure they are being paid fairly for their skills; reduces tax evasion; increases trust in the system.

No doubt there are more that don't come to mind immediately.

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

#102

Post by jdhzzz »

gruez wrote: post #12
varjag wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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?

Uber for salaries.

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

#103

Post by igk »

kalleboo wrote: post #86
ersii wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So, how will they know "if" I'm keeping some of my income undeclared? Remember - this is the DECLARED income that is public.

Snitches. "Oh, he bought a new car? But he only makes XXX a year... I'm gonna report him!"

Yes, how devious. Reporting potential crimes

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

#104

Post by danso »

reitanqild wrote: post #92
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.

What is it now? I'm guessing it's not on the web, which would be vastly more public than in printed form?

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

#106

Post by igk »

gsnedders wrote: post #87
giraffehack wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Alright, but why is that a problem? Might be a cultural difference thing that i'm not seeing. If you signed with the employer to not have any side business going on then it's a different story. But you would know this in the first place, so you would only complain about not being allowed to shoot yourself in the foot.

So it's one thing to imagine you're a programmer who does a small amount of contracting on the side; now imagine you're a teacher who does some "mild" sex work (say, solo camming): the social and financial repercussions on them having their second job disclosed is a real risk. Even from the employer's point-of-view, it's a risk to their reputation for hiring such a person (there again, such a thing seems unlikely to…

So how exactly would they find out how you earn that money? And why would they have the right to terminate you if it's not in the original contract?

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

#107

Post by digi_owl »

Zitrax wrote: post #67

Coming from Sweden and being used to public tax records I was nevertheless a bit surprised at the transparency in Norway when anyone could look up anyone online anonymously. It made it extremely simple to for example create list of everyone at work or on your street (or use the data for any purpose). They later changed it in 2011 (?) such that the other person will get notified about who looked him/her up. I don't kn…

It used to be that each year the reported income and paid tax was printed and placed in a public location (local post office etc). Then some braniac thought they could save some money by just putting it all online. End result was that scrapers were set up etc.

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

#108

Post by kalleboo »

igk wrote: post #103
kalleboo wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Snitches. "Oh, he bought a new car? But he only makes XXX a year... I'm gonna report him!"

Yes, how devious. Reporting potential crimes

Sorry you're right, I edited my comment to remove the implication of jealousy

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

#109

Post by dmoy »

jellicle wrote: post #101
charlesdm wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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..

Reduces gender discrimination; reduces race discrimination; reduces income inequality; allows employees to make sure they are being paid fairly for their skills; reduces tax evasion; increases trust in the system. No doubt there are more that don't come to mind immediately.

I'm not sure it reduces race discrimination in Sweden. It's not as blatantly in your face, but it still affects people greatly.

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

#110

Post by Kiro »

mchaver wrote: post #95
Kiro wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

I've seen some pretty crazy doxing I think would be hard to do in other countries but I've never seen the system be questioned in media.
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