{"id":1539,"date":"2016-01-06T10:39:33","date_gmt":"2016-01-06T18:39:33","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/re-tales.net\/?p=1539"},"modified":"2016-01-06T10:39:33","modified_gmt":"2016-01-06T18:39:33","slug":"when-the-boss-says-dont-tell-your-coworkers-how-much-you-get-paid","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/re-tales.net\/?p=1539","title":{"rendered":"When the Boss Says, ‘Don’t Tell Your Coworkers How Much You Get Paid’"},"content":{"rendered":"
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\u00a0 \u00a0 When I was a store manager with Longs, we had a lot of discretion as to how much we could pay people, unlike today. \u00a0If you had a particularly strong applicant with experience you could offer them more, and if they were doing a good job for you, you were allowed to give merit raises and\/or promote them to higher paying positions.<\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0 The rule “Don’t discuss your pay with anyone else” has always been around, and I have to admit I am guilty of saying it myself, but\u00a0as the article from theatlantic.com<\/a> says,\u00a0apparently it’s illegal to do so! \u00a0 My philosophy was to make sure everyone was being paid fairly, so if there was an inequity in my store for some reason (i.e. new hire making more than someone that had been there for a year) I would generally fix it so that things were right instead of just hoping the underpaid employee didn’t find out, simply because it was the right thing to do. \u00a0You get what you pay for, and managers who tried to squeeze their employees for a dime here or a dime here generally were not successful. \u00a0(Unfortunately in today’s world, they have no choice as raises are only given annually and solely based on performance metrics.)<\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0So I guess the law exists for good reason, if an employee is getting underpaid they have a right to know. \u00a0 If someone is getting paid less for good reason (i.e. poor performance, lack of experience) it should just be explained to them as such and not just kept in the dark. \u00a0Whether or not you tell them “Don’t talk about your pay” they will talk to each other and there’s nothing you can do about that. \u00a0In fact, it’s against the law to tell them that in the first place. \u00a0I learn something new every day.<\/p>\n

Whether I was working as a barista or a paralegal, the story was the same: My employers wanted me to keep my mouth shut about money.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0Last fall, I became a barista in a small, \u201csocially responsible\u201d coffee company. A few months later, I got a temporary paralegal position at one of the world\u2019s biggest multinational, corporate law firms.<\/em>The two companies had little in common, but both told me one thing: Don’t talk to your coworkers about your pay.<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n

At the law firm, this warning was conveyed to me during my salary negotiation. After I had worked for three months through a temp agency, the firm offered me a spot on their payroll. Given the size and success of the firm, the starting salary seemed low.<\/em><\/p>\n

The HR manager tried to convince me that the offer was competitive. She told me that she couldn\u2019t offer more because it would be unfair to other paralegals. She said that if we did not agree to a salary that day, then she would have to suspend me because I would be working past the allowed temp phase. I insisted that she look into a higher offer and she agreed that we could meet again later. Before I left, she had something to add.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/section>\n

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\u201cMake sure you don\u2019t talk about your salary with anyone,\u201d she said sweetly, as if she was giving advice to her own son. \u201cIt causes conflict and people can be let go for doing it.\u201d (This is to the best of my recollection, not verbatim.)<\/em>It wasn\u2019t all that surprising to hear this from a corporate HR manager. What was surprising was the d\u00e9j\u00e0 vu.<\/em><\/p>\n

Just three months earlier, some of my coworkers at the coffee shop told me that our bosses, who worked in the office on salaries, and even the owner, got a higher cut of the tips than we did. One barista told me that when she complained about it, the managers reduced her hours.<\/em><\/p>\n

When you make minimum wage and have to fight for more than 30 hours per week, tips are pretty important, so I sat down with my managers to discuss the controversy. That\u2019s when they told me not to talk about it with the other baristas. The owner \u201chates it when people talk about money,\u201d my manager added, and \u201cwould fire people for it if he could.\u201d I sulked back to the espresso machine, making my lattes at half speed and failing to do side work.<\/em><\/p>\n

In both workplaces, my bosses were breaking the law.<\/em><\/span><\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

Under the National Labor Relations Act of 1935 (NLRA), all workers have the right to engage \u201cconcerted activity for mutual aid or protection\u201d and \u201corganize a union to negotiate with [their] employer concerning [their] wages, hours, and other terms and conditions of employment.\u201d In six states, including my home state of Illinois, the law even more explicitly protects<\/a> the rights of workers to discuss their pay.<\/em><\/p>\n

This is true whether the employers make their threats verbally or on paper and whether the consequences are firing or merely some sort of cold shoulder from management. My managers at the coffee shop seemed to understand that they weren’t allowed to fire me solely for talking about pay, but they may not have known that it is also illegal to discourage employees from discussing their pay with each other. As NYU law professor Cynthia Estlund explained to NPR<\/a>, the law “means that you and your co-workers get to talk together about things that matter to you at work.” Even “a nudge from the boss saying ‘we don’t do that around here’ … is also unlawful under the National Labor Relations Act,” Estlund added.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/section>\n

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And yet, gag rules thrive in workplaces across the country. In a report updated this year, the Institute for Women\u2019s Policy Research found that about half of American employees in all sectors<\/a> are either explicitly prohibited or strongly discouraged from discussing pay with their coworkers. In the private sector, the number is higher, at 61 percent.<\/em>This is why President Obama recently signed two executive actions<\/a> addressing workplace transparency and accountability. One prohibits federal contractors from retaliating against employees who discuss their pay with one another. The other requires contractors to provide compensation data on their employees, including race and sex. But while these actions protect workers at federally contracted employers, they do not affect others.<\/em><\/p>\n

The bill that would cover the rest of workers is the Paycheck Fairness Act<\/a>. The law would both strengthen penalties to employers who retaliate against workers for discussing pay and require employers to provide a justification for wage differentials.<\/em><\/p>\n

These reforms are necessary to address this widespread, illegal problem that the law has failed to address for decades. Gag rules violate a fundamental labor right and allow for discriminatory pay schemes.<\/em><\/p>\n