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Comment by eesmith | Hacker News Reader

The asymmetry in market information reduces your ability to negotiate. If you buy into the belief that it should be a taboo topic, you give more power to employers.

Salary should be public information, just like it is already in some countries and for government jobs. Here's the salary for the "Ed Smith"s in Florida - https://salaries.myflorida.com/?utf8=%E2%9C%93&by_name=Ed+Sm...

The highest paid is a state judge named "Jared Smith", pulling $165,509.04/year. The only "Edward" earns $113,300.04/year.

When I worked at a public university, my salary was public.

Remember, in many cases it is illegal for your employer to reprimand you for discussing your salary. https://www.govdocs.com/can-employees-discuss-pay-salaries/ and Colorado’s 2008 Wage Transparency Act (https://www.littler.com/publication-press/publication/colora... )

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I agree with this in general, but let’s not forget that everyone has a different budget structure and comparing these is apples to oranges. On one hand, that guy has a family and obviously is short on everything, but on the other, this guy has no family and spends on various substituting activities to make up their life. The difference may be 5-10x, but personally I don’t care how much it is to someone, if that is my baseline. It is not like free money, it is like that some people are cash sinks by design and operate out of some negative basis. If they didn’t, they couldn’t be themselves.

Also, sudden 10x may destroy your identity in just a year. In my circles it’s called to punch with money. Most people cannot manage that and become hostages of their various delusions.

You think the employer should pay based on what employees will do with their income, not what the employee provides to the company?

I mean, great, that's Marxism 101 - "to each according to his needs" - and I can respect that.

But does the employer get to decide if the employee's budget structure is appropriate? Surely a progressive income tax would cut down on the 10x differential, and strong social services would help support the family.

employer should pay based on what employees will do with their income, not what the employee provides to the company?

Neither. It is all based on negotiation and people negotiate based on their baseline needs (sorry for this tautology).

My father, with a family to support as the sole breadwinner, was a lousy negotiator.

Someone who "has no family and spends" the extra time learning salary negotiation can accept a higher risk of failure, would be negotiating from a stronger position.

So I don't see how your examples have much bearing - the company is going to pay for what they can profit from, not what the employee needs. If my father doesn't know what comparable positions pay, he has a harder time knowing if (say) 3% pay increases per year is appropriate for his position.

This is exactly why I share my salary. In order to curb the pay disparities in marginalized groups, we have to be willing to be honest about wages.

I would support legislation to make everyone’s transparent, but I am not going to sacrifice my individual advantage and just hope everyone else does too. Assuming I am above the median.

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