As long as there is some-one in your friend-circle earning more than you , you are bound to be unhappy. Firm don’t want you to be unhappy and hence forbid you to discuss about compensation.
Humor apart , but back in India I found that this is common topic around water-cooler among friends. I was never aware of the sensitivity of the topic till last week.
But in Japan and in Financial industry environment , it is very sensitive topic. Two employees are fired recently in firm X for openly discussing about Bonus issues and others are reminded that this is confidential matter.
I was surprised and turn to Google to satisfy curiosity.
- In one of the surveys 51% mentioned that there is no policy regarding pay-confidentiality.
- Surprisingly in some of places ,it is illegal to forbid employees , and they can share information about wages.
- I personally feel that this is little gray area , as packages of top management are published and considered a good governance practice. Further salaries are openly discussed with recruiters and with tax-consultants.
- Simple web-search or even casual talk with other HR-executives shows that there is no clarity about this topic and no concrete answers available. I would like to hear some views on this. Any pointers to legal articles will be highly appreciated
