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Comment by pcmaffey | Hacker News Reader

Transparency always shows the ugly unfair side of things when the sheets are first lifted... That's the whole point. People adjust and systems adjust, and we figure out how to better work together.

Salaries are a reflection of the value you're supposedly contributing to society. Isn't that on principle public?

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Salaries are a reflection of your supply and demand. Two people with equal demand but unequal supply (one has financial obligations that make them unavailable below a certain salary level) will result in unequal pay.

The notion that salary is meant to be directly tied to productivity does not and has not ever reflected reality.

Current hires are not a fixed supply to be taken for granted.

Hire someone else for a ton extra, refuse me a raise, and I'll leave.

That is, if that information was available. Kinda convenient that it isn't, huh?

It is absolutely convenient to be able to retain talent for as cheap as possible. Just like it is convenient to pit two suppliers against each other to drive costs down.

Quitting because you don't get a raise doesn't change anything unless you have an alternative that will pay you more. In which case, that alternative is a negotiating piece independent of a coworkers salary.

Long story short, have alternatives.

If you leave, even if you are leaving to a worse salary, you are hurting the former company. If that company considers you to be worth whatever they're paying you (read: they can't find someone better for less) than they will give you the raise rather than let you go. All you need to know is the maximum amount they are willing to pay you, which you can then negotiate for.

> Hire someone else for a ton extra, refuse me a raise, and I'll leave.

Hmm.... Wouldn't this inflate the economy? (Edit: seems that it doesn't, at least in Norway.)

I assume there always will be the cases where someone is needed urgently, so such hires are unavoidable.

Salaries are a proxy for value, but how we measure that value in a capitalist society, is most certainly driven by supply and demand. We should be careful not to project the inadequacies of the measuring device onto what's being measured.

Salary cannot exceed the value provided, but otherwise it often does not reflect value. Take for example cleaners, without whom no company could exist (i.e. they provide a lot of value), and yet, because of s&d, they're paid minimum wage.

> Salary cannot exceed the value provided

CEO's of fortune 500, investment bankers, etc...

Salaries are at best weakly correlated to contribution to society. Somebody raising their own children is contributing to society, for example, usually without salary. And producing food is probably a more valuable contribution than arguing in court about patents on round corners and such.

> And producing food is probably a more valuable contribution than arguing in court about patents on round corners and such.

The key point of the marginal revolution is it isn't the aggregate contribution that matters, but the marginal.

The canonical example is diamonds and water. We all need water, so why does it cost a fraction of what a tiny diamond costs?

> producing food is probably a more valuable contribution...

This is a commonly held belief, but I wonder if it's actually true? The important things produced in the United States are largely possible because of intellectual property rights, and we pay people to not make food.

So you shouldn't be allowed to anonymously contribute to society? Does this include whistle blowers?

Begs the question of whether whistle blowers would be needed if there was more transparency, right?

Only if there will be a complete and enforced transparency, so no one would be able to do anything with secrecy.

Sort of "The Circle" setting.

Of course you should. But if you anonymously contribute to society, who do you expect to pay you for it?

Sure, you can still make anonymous donations to the charities of your choice.

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