Lately we seem to be a country more and more at battle with itself. In one corner is the employee vs employer, battle over salary transparency. This would bring major changes to some of the nation’s most powerful companies from Wall Street to Silicon Valley.
A small number of states already have wage-disclosure laws that require most workplaces to list pay ranges on their job postings. These policies which are meant to narrow the gender pay gaps could become more common, as New York City is set to enact sweeping legislation in November and California sent a bill to the governor’s desk for a decision by the end of September.
Talking about money in the office and within some families used to be taboo. But younger workers are more comfortable discussing how much they make, a phenomenon their older colleagues find as befuddling as TikTok. I have been a fan of transparency for years, based upon casual conversations, observations and money management I use to guestimate people salaries and household income, much to the cringe of others who were not fans of this skill.
There are hidden effects of pay transparency that warp the way people view success, and that’s why hockey’s unplanned experiment is worth another look today: We could all learn a thing or two from a few hundred people a few decades ago.
How much do you make?