a senior developer with 5 years of experience will be paid the same rate as a senior developer with 10 years because companies don't want unhappy employees and people with the same titles will be upset they are not paid the same rate
Really? People are all too stupid to understand the value of experience or skill? Personal experience says this is nonsense.
and allow many companies to legally collude and pay similar rates
Have you looked at any news about how horribly ineffective OPEC is? There are too many countries with too much capacity outside the cartel, countries in the cartel cheat on their quotas, ... .
Cartels are not as effective as you think they are.
For the individual, not having public salary works great because you really do have negotiating power.
Say what? The companies already know how much they're paying everyone else. The only one who doesn't know is you.
If my next company knows that all other companies in the industry are paying 20% less for my position, why would they pay me more?
Because you can make a convincing argument that you're worth 20% more.
I've never understood why smart people want to willingly give the more powerful in this world even more tools that will work against them.
The powerful already have those tools. This is about giving those same tools to the less powerful as well.
> Because you can make a convincing argument that you're worth 20% more.
Except since everyone in the same position at the company will see you're making 20% more the company will have to either pay all of existing employees in the same position 20% more or convince them their new hire is 20% better than all of them.
It seems like the effect would be that either they can't offer you the 20% because they can't afford to give everyone a 20% raise OR several employees will leave because they feel slighted this new guy is getting paid more
Most salaries for all occupations across the board are almost the same. I believe this is one of the results of public tax/salary information.
"Because you can make a convincing argument that you're worth 20% more."
Like I said, if everything is public, it won't matter. If I see that all of my competitors are paying 20% less (which won't be difficult to aggregate with everything public..a search engine for employers will popup in no time) I know that even if the potential employee goes somewhere else, they won't get a higher wage. Why would I pay them any more?
On an Individual basis, I can also figure out exactly what you were paid at your last job (instead of guess work/relying on what you are asking). If you were paid $50K at your last job, why am I going to pay you $70K?
"The powerful already have those tools. This is about giving those same tools to the less powerful as well."
As an individual, privacy is a great tool to have at your disposal and is one of the only ways to defend against powerful companies taking advantage of you.
Really? People are all too stupid to understand the value of experience or skill? Personal experience says this is nonsense.
and allow many companies to legally collude and pay similar rates
Have you looked at any news about how horribly ineffective OPEC is? There are too many countries with too much capacity outside the cartel, countries in the cartel cheat on their quotas, ... .
Cartels are not as effective as you think they are.
For the individual, not having public salary works great because you really do have negotiating power.
Say what? The companies already know how much they're paying everyone else. The only one who doesn't know is you.
If my next company knows that all other companies in the industry are paying 20% less for my position, why would they pay me more?
Because you can make a convincing argument that you're worth 20% more.
I've never understood why smart people want to willingly give the more powerful in this world even more tools that will work against them.
The powerful already have those tools. This is about giving those same tools to the less powerful as well.