[geebee]

Actually, I worked for a the UC system where all salaries were made public in an easily searchable database. The sky didn't fall.

My only real problem with it is that I feel it puts the UC system at an unfair disadvantage. Imagine if you could look up salaries for your competitor's workers, but they couldn't look up yours? This is essentially the situation for UC relative to a lot of private universities, even though massive amounts of government funding flow into private universities (with a tax exemption on endowment growth, too).

I actually think that all companies that make use government subsidies program should be required to disclose employee salaries the same way that state government do. And I absolutely do think that the H1B program should count as a government subsidy (Milton Friedman recognized it as a subsidy, because it was changing the rules for only a certain segment of the economy).

Overall, I actually think it would be beneficial to publish all salaries, and I really don't think it would cause the kind of problems people worry about. It would also real even the playing field between employers and employees.

Think about it this way - all real estate transactions are made public. But imagine if you were bidding on a house, but only the real estate agents actually knew what every house in your neighborhood had sold for. You were forced to go by little bits of gossip here and there. You'd be at a terrible disadvantage!