It should be noted that prohibiting employees from (voluntarily) disclosing their own wages and other terms of employment is illegal, assuming you are an employer subject to the NRLA (and if you aren’t then your salaries are probably public record anyway.)
I work in an office that is cobbled together from three different employers, each having a contract with this organization to produce a certain product, together as a team/cohesive unit. Two of the employers are public; the State and the local School Board. The third employer (and there’s supposed to be a fourth soon as a company has executed a contract to provide additional employees to this office, among other things) is a private employer based in a large city in Texas. This is a small city in Florida.
One thing I learned from the HR lady at my last job, is that private salaries are often market-driven, and HR people try to keep them in line with similiar positions in other companies in the same city, and those are scaled given the cost of living in that area. For example, Florida does not have state income tax, so our salaries tend to be lower. When I moved here from another state, my salary was actually lower, but all that did was make up the difference from the state income tax I’d had to pay, so my take-home was exactly the same.
Anyway, my employer is based in Texas, in a very large metro area, which is far, far more expensive to live in than where I live. There are also multiple employment options in my specific field in that city, whereas in this city, there are very few options in my line of work. So, for my position, I make about 20% more than the average person in this city doing basically the same job, because I’m paid on a scale based on another market (and I am probably right in line with the other people on my team/in my same position back in the home office). The other couple dozen people who work here, work for the state or the school board. The state pays marginally better than the school board. My private employer offers a far more generous benefits and time off package, compared to the state and school board employees here.
Talking about my salary would be the best way to find myself persona non grata around here because I make 20-30% more than other people doing the exact. same. job. I am no more or less qualified – in general, I have probably less education (nothing past a BS), but probably years more experience.
In fact, we don’t even have the same paid holidays. Often, this office is closed for a paid holiday that my company does not pay for. I have to either work at home (on projects for the home office in Texas) or pull a vacation day. I get an hour for lunch, unpaid. They get a half-hour, paid. Really, we’d be comparing apples to oranges.
Furthermore, I’m one of the only ones who is both unmarried and not a parent. So I have way more disposable income than just about everyone. I try to not even talk much about new purchases or shop for new clothes too much (and I don’t buy good quality, pricey clothes on purpose – I shop where everyone else shops so I fit in).
Anyway, I find the more I make as time goes on, the less comfortable I feel discussing it because I don’t want people who make less (for doing the same or even more/harder work) feeling badly, or resenting me, or thinking I’m trying to rub their noses in my success.
I realize that’s an unusual structure for a given workplace, but we have reasons, man. I think the public employees’ salaries are published, but only in the sense that salary ranges are published. If the range for a given pay grade is $20-50K, I have no way of knowing where a given person is on that scale.
Why DO we hide our pay from our co-workers?
Because finances are personal?
Since I work for the state, my salary is public record so we all pretty much know what each other makes or can find it out.
I don’t mind people knowing how much I make, unless they work at my company. I’ll tell strangers and family and friends my pay rate with no compunctions, but never my coworkers. We all know each others’ bad habits, I don’t want to judge them, and I don’t want them to judge me.
Well, they are talking about their salary, not you about theirs. Was that kind of discussion, revealing no confidential information not owned by the speaker, forbidden?
Looking does not imply speaking. When we did salary administration we had to look at, and discuss, all the salaries. The salary of the managers was not in the list, of course, but we all did the comparisons.
Of course no one ever discussed this outside of the meeting room.
I was kind of curious if lots of companies had the same issues we did.
I believe the idea behind the prohibition (besides the law) was that once people knew that I had looked, they would be tempted to ask this kind of question -
Not from me - I never discussed it, or thought about it much.
Regards,
Shodan
But why are they personal? It’s not like “don’t discuss the salary” is a directive from God. And in plenty of places, salaries are perfectly ordinary topics of conversation. This is a particular taboo that we have, and it comes from somewhere.
It’s a loaded topic in the general culture of the US. Salary is tied in to self worth just like body weight is. For the same reason women don’t talk about how much they weigh, people don’t talk about how much they make. And also, if someone were to ask me how much I make, I would wonder why they were asking, unless their was a very specific reason for the question. If they are asking, it is highly likely they are assessing you as a human being based upon how much you make; it is a very gauche thing to do. Honestly though, I am probably a bit of an outlier; much of my social interaction is around people who separate their work from the rest of their life to such an extent that I only have a vague idea what some of my more casual acquaintances do for a living.
That’s exactly my point, even sven. I get that some people don’t want to discuss their salary for whatever personal reason. Fine; got it. I don’t have any problem with that, either.
I know for most public service salaries, at least in Canada, salary rates are published and for good reason. When taxpayers are footing the bill I believe they should have the right to know, and that especially should include Ministers and managers.
My issue is with corporate management actively trying to forbid me from discussing what I make.
I think it is a more sensitive topic in the workplace than outside. Different industries/professions have very different pay scales. A new person in publishing, say, will make a lot less than a new person working for Google, but that doesn’t mean anything about how well they are doing at work. If you make a lot less than a co-worker it might. And it probably feels like it does.
Because our culture instills in us the notion that how much we make represents how much we are worth. Not just to a company, but to society as a whole.
I’m betting in communal cultures or places where no one assumes the world operates as a meritocracy, how much one makes isn’t that big of a deal. It’s neither a reason to gloat or feel embarrassed. And there is probably an expectation that OF COURSE one would freely talk about it, because to do so would be to intentionally hide valuable information from the (needy) group. But our society is not like this.
I can’t imagine talking about salary without feeling embarrassed unless I know for certain everyone in the room makes the same amount. It seems as if you this is some kind of unnatural hang-up or something. That is weird to me.
Just because we have a taboo that other cultures don’t have doesn’t mean WE are the ones who need to do some soul-searching. I think there is a difference between making sure your salary is competitive by doing your homework and talking about your paycheck at the water cooler with whomever just happens to be in the room.
Yeah, I’m not really sure how the example given by Sven makes any sense unless one knows absolutely nothing about the different cultural context that exists in China. For example:
“The power of collectivist beliefs was was illustrated when PepsicCo rewarded one of its managers in China with a sizable cash bonus that he divided equally among his subordinates.”*
Just a little bit different relationship to money and wages than in the US.
*“Formula for Success,” Financial world, December 8, 1992, p.40.
I never said we are wrong or that there is a better way-- personally, I think it is what it is-- but I want to point out that it isn’t universal and there are lot of ways to think about it. Even within the States, different communities have different ways of dealing with it. I grew up in a poor neighborhood, and where to get money, how much you could get, and where to spend it most efficiently was not just ordinary conversation, it was one of the main topics of discussion. I think a lot of people are universalizing what is essentially a middle class value here.
Anyway, my office’s salaries are basically printed on the org chart, and the world hasn’t come tumbling down. This is a social affectation. not a practical one.
1992 is practically the stone age when it comes to business in China.
“Because I should be payed more than Brenda!”
“Bob gets how much? He doesn’t do anything!”
“Sorry boss, I know how much you make, you’re buying lunch!”
After a while, the benefits of people not knowing outweigh the negatives of human drama.
The point is about cultural differences. Would you prefer a more current reference? I will provide one if you need that to better understand the point I am making.
I’m not sure which part isn’t true.
**The issue of “I am more productive than her, I deserve the same (or more) salary” is off the table. ** Well, lots of people at my government jobs have said this. But they didn’t actually expect it to make a difference - you get paid according to your pay grade and how many steps you have gone up the scale.Productivity doesn’t have a thing to do with it.
The issue of “Give me a raise or I quit” is off the table. I’ve never heard of a government employee saying this. In both of the governments I’ve worked for , it’s just not possible for most jobs. And the few jobs where it is possible tend to be populated by people who would never say that- the job title/power/status are more important to them than the money. (It’s not all that uncommon in my state for subordinates to earn more than their supervisors, or for a promotion to end up effectively being a pay cut. But people still take them.)
I got in trouble over this, way back in the 80’s. I was promoted from a journeyman tool & Die classification, the highest paid group in the hourly ranks, to engineer. To put me on salary, the practice was to get a raise of about 20%. I had worked for years as a hourly, union employee, and had kept my pay stubs in my toolbox. When I was promoted, I started keeping the stubs in my desk drawer. One of my new coworker’s went into my drawer to get a pen or something, and found the latest pay stubb laying on top. Turned out, I was making more as a journeyman than engineers that had been there less than 10 years or so. Not to mention the 20% bump… I got a lecture from my supervisor about not leaving them in the workplace. I was pretty pissed that the weasel had gone into my desk, but I really couldn’t get into his face and talk about his mama, as I was used to when dealing with weasels. Shortly after that, GM eliminated the COLA formula for salary folks. And we had a multiyear pay freeze for salary. After 5 years, I went back to my hourly gig, and ended up making much more money than I would have if I stayed as a engineer. And I kept my pension, unlike mr weasel…
I do think in a union situation, it is pretty common to comment on income. We always knew, or could easily figure out what everybody was making. I never saw any issues with it.
I worked for 2 different automakers, GM & Chrysler. I never saw that arguing productivity was very effective in salary discussions. And if you threaten to quit, they would tell you where the door was.
A promotion was commonly a pay cut for some folks, a person could work very hard, lots of extra hours, in a job that paid overtime, and when promoted, get into a job that did not pay ot. Some guys simply never got promoted, on purpose. But the companies didn’t like that, and usually figured out a way to move them out of their little “home”.
Being a salary employee sucked!!