Is this oppressive transparency? Norway (like Steemit) has all salaries available for public inspection

in politics •  7 years ago 
  • Do publicly revealed salaries promote "communist" ideology? If everyone knows how much everyone else is getting paid then does envy (jealousy) get provoked in the zeitgeist to push for a fixed salary determined by the job title rather than more flexible salaries?

  • Can transparency backfire and result in new degrees and flavors of oppression by the feelings of the general population?

  • Is Norway the sort of model for what Steemit should be like, where the rewards are equalized?

The fact that anonymous searches are no longer permitted discourages criminals from searching for wealthy people to target.

But the problem is what would stop "criminals" from bribing people to do random searches, create a secret database, and then access that? I would think this is very naive to think criminals can't do anonymous searches.

There have been other stories about children from low-income families who have been bullied in school, by classmates who looked up their parents' financial situation.

And this is ethical or not?

References


  1. http://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-40669239
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Don't have an answer, but I think that it's a step in the right direction. No-one knows the exact right answer to that but I believe collectively, having the public scrutinize things is better than operating in a complete black box (eg China).

China has the human flesh search engine and social credit. Not sure why you used China as the example when they are more transparent by far than the US.

An interesting question. I have no answer of course .

Hi, my friend @dana-edwards , great post, congratulations, keep it up.

Why not. Open source everything.

Another catch phrase like "code is law". What does that even mean? How does it benefit your life?

Money is the root to all evil , within every system and society today

LOVE of money, not money itself.

Money is how you get people to cooperate who aren't friends and who aren't religious.

It's sad honestly , money everyone finds happiness with , material things

Everything comes down to material things. There is not one thing you claim to be non-material that will end up in material benefit.

Then what do we do , to be different ?

I'm not sure that's the right question, unless your objective itself is to be different. If you want to make a difference, thinking outside the box could be your best ally.

It's not that money makes people happy but it keeps people happy and alive. If you aren't able to be happy without a lot of money then having a lot of money wont change that but if you can be happy and don't have to worry about money then it's a lot easier to stay happy.

That is just wrong.. loads of evil exist without money as a factor.. or please, if you really mean it is.. proove it.

Univ of Texas and its affiliates like MD Anderson post everyone's salaries.

The difference between Steemit and the government in Norway is the government aspect. If this sort of thing breeds jealously in people, it also exposes the greedy among us. Yes, the jealous who want the fruits of others are the greedy ones.

I would be more worried about my spendings being public.

I like privacy, but I think fighting corruption wthout transparency is impossible. The equilibrium is difficult to reach but I think salaries being public is a good idea. Not a detailed report, just the toal income, and maybe even with some error (50 000- 60 000 $ per year instead of the exact amount for example)

I am also concerned about cryptocurrencies, I do not want them to became the evolution of Swiss banks when Switzerland removes bank secrecy.

Openness and transparency is useful only if it benefits the security of the individual. Corruption isn't inherently right or wrong as it depends on the consequences of it.

My point is, privacy at times benefits security and reduces risks but at other times or possible in the same time it can introduce new risks. Depending on what you're more concerned about (jealous people robbing you or corruption) will determine what is better for your security.

A person who is making more money than most people or who is wealthy does not want the whole world to know because to be wealthy or high income is to be a target. The majority of people might favor transparency because they have less to lose than the wealthy minority.

Corruption is a robbery, it must be prosecuted by law no matter the moral circumstances.

Most wealthy people wear expensive clothes, use an expensive smartphone, live in expensive houses, and most of them are famous people. so there are already a target.

Those who do not want to make expensive expenditures in order to maintain privacy do not need so much money, they could donate a big amount to the government or charities and only declare the amount obtained for personal spending.

I never thought of it that way @dana-edwards, and you could be right.

I'm still for openness and transparency, even though it might attract jealousy if you're successful.

Openness and transparency is useful only if it benefits the security of the individual.

Salaries in Norway ARE public, but they implemented a funny thing. The person you are checking out will see that it was YOU who checked him/her out. That's just too embarrasing. So no one does that anymore. Sure, there are some services that offer to search for you for a small fee. But people hardly waste two dollars to check out former classmates or neighbours. :)