Talking about what you earn is uncomfortable. Whenever the subject comes up, we often try to move on or gloss over it. It still feels taboo or wrong, but are there any legal implications to discussing your salary with your colleagues? And how is our politeness around the taboo fuelling the gender pay gap?
In our recent LinkedIn polls, 77% of 265 respondents said they did not discuss their salary with their colleagues, and 63% of 319 respondents said they did not discuss their salary with their friends.
The OECD’s key findings on Pay Transparency Tools to Close the Gender Wage Gap disclose that ‘pay transparency offers a relatively simple and intuitive tool to both identify and address the gender wage gap.’
With women in the UK still paid just 90p for every £1 earned by men, according to the Government’s Gender Pay Gap reporting mechanism, is the culture of pay taboo contributing to the Gender Pay Gap, and what can we do about it?
What is the current law around salary discussions?
It may come as a surprise to you to know that there are no laws to prevent you from discussing your salary with your colleagues.
Metro notes that employees have the legal right to discuss pay, and it is illegal for employers to ban such discussions. The Equality Act of 2010 states that ‘employees have the right to discuss salary for collective bargaining or protection’. In this case, if multiple employees are underpaid, they can come together to request collective fair pay from their employer.
When we unpack this further, we find that in most cases, the cultural taboo surrounding financial discussions peaks in the workplace, where we are nervous about compromising our position in the company. Hence, while discussing your salary with your employees is not unlawful, it can be uncomfortable and make you feel in a compromising position.
Metro argues that the politeness surrounding workplace discussions of pay is not helping us, but ‘instead, it’s serving anyone upholding the gender pay gap.’
What are people saying?
A recent Glassdoor survey found that 3/4 of respondents believe that pay transparency is good for employee satisfaction.
Furthermore, research released only last week (12th of May 2022) confirms that a third of women in the tech industry feel uncomfortable asking for a pay rise.
Last year, Catriona Harvey-Jenner wrote for Marie Claire that the lack of pay transparency, both by employers in job adverts etc. and through college discussions, was fuelling the gender pay gap. Pay secrecy contributes to a lack of accountability, further widening the divide in earnings.
The Fawcett Society’s poll of 2,200 people further shows that 61% of women and 53% of men said being asked about their salary had damaged their confidence in asking for better pay.
It is essential to acknowledge that for women, people of colour and disabled people, multiple intersecting discriminations are faced in the workplace, contributing to and maintaining pay gaps. Jemima Olchawski, CEO of the Fawcett Society, summarises that “women, people of colour and disabled people are much more likely to be paid less than men. So, when you ask about salary history, past pay discrimination and bias follow through from one job to the next, perpetuating gender, disability and ethnicity pay gaps.”
What initiatives exist or are coming?
In January, New York City enacted legislation ‘requiring all covered employers to include a minimum and maximum salary for the position advertised.’
The law was meant to come into effect earlier this week on the 15th of May; however, the New York City Council have since pushed the date back to November 1st 2022.
Here in the UK, Minister for Women, Baroness Stedman Scott, announced on International Women’s Day that a new ‘initiative will seek to improve pay transparency in the job application process and help businesses who want to go even further in attracting women to their positions’.
Other initiatives announced include a returners programme to support women in STEM roles after taking time out for caring duties and a pilot scheme to close salary gaps by publishing salaries on all job advertisements.
Baroness Scott says, “We believe that increased pay transparency will build on positive evidence of the role information can play when it comes to empowering women in the workplace. We must keep women at the forefront of the levelling up agenda as we recover from the pandemic and rebuild together.”
What do you think? Do you think pay secrecy fuels the gender pay gap? What measures would you recommend to narrow the current gap? Contact us and let us know your thoughts—we love to hear them.
You might also be interested in our blog post, The Truth about Enhanced Maternity Pay. Read it here.
And if you’re inspired to renegotiate your salary after reading this blog post, don’t miss our blog post, Ten East Ways to Negotiate a Higher Job Offer – helping you get the pay you deserve!