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When the Boss Says, 'Don't Tell Your Coworkers How Much You Get Paid'

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Re: When the Boss Says, 'Don't Tell Your Coworkers How Much You Get Paid'

#171

Post by mattdw »

rmc wrote: post #114
smm2000 wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

18% number is bullshit debunked many times. When you control for occupation, working hours, etc between male and female - the difference in pay is only 2-3%

Ah, but what if the reason women are in lower paid jobs is because if sexism?

There's a case currently in front of the employment courts here in NZ which is confronting this directly. A group of aged-care nurses (working in retirement homes etc.) have made a claim to the employment court that (a) it's a female-dominated vocation, (b) it's lower paid than other similar vocations (by demands, skills, qualifications etc) and (c) that (a) and (b) are linked.

The case has made it through preliminary hearings and is now proceeding to a higher court; if they win a massive precedent will be set, allowing for claims of gender discrimination at the level of entire industries and vocations.

(I think it's totally a fair claim.)

Re: When the Boss Says, 'Don't Tell Your Coworkers How Much You Get Paid'

#172

Post by curiously »

I had co-workers tell me 'its rude to share salaries'. This tech company in Vancouver was well known to pay the lowest salary in North America and excruciating overtime.

I always find it amusing how hard people will fight over something so small, when there's so little to gain, people will work so hard for it.

Re: When the Boss Says, 'Don't Tell Your Coworkers How Much You Get Paid'

#173

Post by throwaway217384 »

klibertp wrote: post #70
throwaway217384 wrote: post #25

I work for a smaller software company (~25 employees) and basically manage all things IT (internal business IT and software development). I'm responsible for the IT budget, our software developer salaries are the single largest company "expense". When I started several years ago it came to my attention that the existing developers and IT staff were drastically underpaid (there was one other internal developer, an int…

> And as much as I hate office politics, emotions getting in the way, and having to hack psychology, they exist and as the logical, analytical, and rational person I think I am those things must be factored into going about things. You obviously thought about this and got it into account. But being a bit smarter ape that we are all, you decided on what way of going about this is best for you. As a rational ape you sh…

You might be right. I suppose I did what I did for some what selfish reasons. I should have just shut my yapper and let the timid and ignorant coworkers continue on or I should have told them, caused serious issues with the company I was just hired at and job back into the job search in a town with some but limited opportunities.

One of the gentlemen ended up leaving with in a year. I had been asking him to fill out a self performance assessment so I could get him a hefty raise. The other guy is quite timid, somewhat immature, and socially inept... I suppose he was getting paid what he and his personality deserves. No?

Or I could have gone about righting the ship rather than throwing all the weight on one side and sinking it... causing not only the two underpaid guys to lose their jobs but also the rest of the dozen employees. Which would be the more appropriate move in your opinion?

Re: When the Boss Says, 'Don't Tell Your Coworkers How Much You Get Paid'

#174

Post by throwaway217384 »

klibertp wrote: post #70
throwaway217384 wrote: post #25

I work for a smaller software company (~25 employees) and basically manage all things IT (internal business IT and software development). I'm responsible for the IT budget, our software developer salaries are the single largest company "expense". When I started several years ago it came to my attention that the existing developers and IT staff were drastically underpaid (there was one other internal developer, an int…

> And as much as I hate office politics, emotions getting in the way, and having to hack psychology, they exist and as the logical, analytical, and rational person I think I am those things must be factored into going about things. You obviously thought about this and got it into account. But being a bit smarter ape that we are all, you decided on what way of going about this is best for you. As a rational ape you sh…

It seems many people on HN prefer rocky revolutions over stable progressive improvements and reform.

Re: When the Boss Says, 'Don't Tell Your Coworkers How Much You Get Paid'

#175

Post by throwaway217384 »

klibertp wrote: post #70
throwaway217384 wrote: post #25

I work for a smaller software company (~25 employees) and basically manage all things IT (internal business IT and software development). I'm responsible for the IT budget, our software developer salaries are the single largest company "expense". When I started several years ago it came to my attention that the existing developers and IT staff were drastically underpaid (there was one other internal developer, an int…

> And as much as I hate office politics, emotions getting in the way, and having to hack psychology, they exist and as the logical, analytical, and rational person I think I am those things must be factored into going about things. You obviously thought about this and got it into account. But being a bit smarter ape that we are all, you decided on what way of going about this is best for you. As a rational ape you sh…

If you were one of them... wait, I know you'd never be one of them because you come off as a smarter ape, investigative, not ignorant, not naive, not timid, capable of caring for yourself. You'd have been gone before I got there.

If you'd like I could just as easily justified by rationalizing why they deserve what they were getting paid... because that's what they were getting paid. Their backgrounds/education wasn't very strong and (at least one of them) had poor judgement and reasoning skills (I mean look what he was accepting for pay!).

ADD: The one I probably wouldn't have ever hired in the first place, but he was there before, knew a fare amount of the current situation, and unfortunately got hired because his mom new one of the managing partners. The managing partners were also somewhat clueless to what they were wrongly paying...

Re: When the Boss Says, 'Don't Tell Your Coworkers How Much You Get Paid'

#176

Post by Htsthbjig »

czep wrote: post #136
UnoriginalGuy wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> A solution is to just make everyone's tax reports public. Hell no. I don't want to be targeted be advertisers, penalised by insurers, and become a target for robbery because I have my personal information spread around for everyone to see. There's a lot of personal shit on your tax return. Far more than is even apparent. It can also expose your side business to your employer which could cause issues. I'm all for sa…

Criminals and marketers already know how rich you are based on where you live. Published tax forms will have no effect on your probability of being robbed. It argue tax forms are private, but that's what's at issue here. Many societies think this should be public information. It goes a long way towards preventing graft.

Criminals and marketers already know how rich you are based on where you live.

Not true.Read this:

http://www.amazon.com/The-Millionaire-Next-Door-Surprising/d...

The fact is that most rich people live without showing off. They enjoy having the freedom to do in their lives what they want but they do not want other people kidnapping their children or blackmailing them. Or just people behaving different with them because of the money.

You know Bill Gates used to park his car like everybody else in MS, until it became impossible for him to park without having 1 or 2 people ask him for money(on the tens of thousand of dollars each time).

Or ask me. I am not Bill Gates, but for people in my environment I have "made it".

Just putting my name in my HN account will significantly change how people react to my comments.

Re: When the Boss Says, 'Don't Tell Your Coworkers How Much You Get Paid'

#177

Post by paulhauggis »

tbrownaw wrote: post #148
paulhauggis wrote: post #88

If all salary was displayed publicly it wouldn't help the employee. It would take almost all negotiating abilities away (a senior developer with 5 years of experience will be paid the same rate as a senior developer with 10 years because companies don't want unhappy employees and people with the same titles will be upset they are not paid the same rate) and allow many companies to legally collude and pay similar rate…

a senior developer with 5 years of experience will be paid the same rate as a senior developer with 10 years because companies don't want unhappy employees and people with the same titles will be upset they are not paid the same rate Really? People are all too stupid to understand the value of experience or skill? Personal experience says this is nonsense. and allow many companies to legally collude and pay similar r…

"Say what? The companies already know how much they're paying everyone else. The only one who doesn't know is you."

I'm talking about company A knowing all of the salaries of company B and C.

Here is a link I found talking about Swedish salaries (2012):

http://lostinstockholm.com/2012/01/10/average-salaries-in-sw...

Most salaries for all occupations across the board are almost the same. I believe this is one of the results of public tax/salary information.

"Because you can make a convincing argument that you're worth 20% more."

Like I said, if everything is public, it won't matter. If I see that all of my competitors are paying 20% less (which won't be difficult to aggregate with everything public..a search engine for employers will popup in no time) I know that even if the potential employee goes somewhere else, they won't get a higher wage. Why would I pay them any more?

On an Individual basis, I can also figure out exactly what you were paid at your last job (instead of guess work/relying on what you are asking). If you were paid $50K at your last job, why am I going to pay you $70K?

"The powerful already have those tools. This is about giving those same tools to the less powerful as well."

As an individual, privacy is a great tool to have at your disposal and is one of the only ways to defend against powerful companies taking advantage of you.

Re: When the Boss Says, 'Don't Tell Your Coworkers How Much You Get Paid'

#178

Post by elwell »

tbrownaw wrote: post #131
sxp wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you know the salary of the people you're directly working with, things can get awkward. One alternative is to discuss salary with people who are sufficiently distant from your daily work but are expected to be making the same amount as you. For large companies, this would be people in different divisions who have the same title and years of experience. For small companies, you will probably need to talk to people…

If you know the salary of the people you're directly working with, things can get awkward. One alternative is to discuss salary with people who are sufficiently distant from your daily work What about things like everyone writing down how much they make and putting it in a hat? Everyone gets all the numbers and how they compare with everyone else, but doesn't know which other number goes with which person.

Isn't that what glassdoor.com is for?

Re: When the Boss Says, 'Don't Tell Your Coworkers How Much You Get Paid'

#179

Post by sokoloff »

mattdw wrote: post #171
rmc wrote: post #114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ah, but what if the reason women are in lower paid jobs is because if sexism?

There's a case currently in front of the employment courts here in NZ which is confronting this directly. A group of aged-care nurses (working in retirement homes etc.) have made a claim to the employment court that (a) it's a female-dominated vocation, (b) it's lower paid than other similar vocations (by demands, skills, qualifications etc) and (c) that (a) and (b) are linked. The case has made it through preliminar…

How is the wage level for an industry segment not related to the simple supply and demand relationship for labor in that segment?
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