Slashdot Mirror


HR Departments Tell Equifax Your Entire Salary History

chiguy writes with this snippet From NBC News: "The Equifax credit reporting agency, with the aid of thousands of human resource departments around the country, has assembled...[a database]...containing 190 million employment and salary records covering more than one-third of U.S. adults...[Equifax] says [it] is adding 12 million records annually.' This salary information is for sale: "Its database is so detailed that it contains week-by-week paystub information dating back years for many individuals, as well as ... health care provider, whether someone has dental insurance and if they've ever filed an unemployment claim.""

6 of 472 comments (clear)

  1. Privacy And Sin by smittyoneeach · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Privacy and sin,
    Like skin on the chin,
    Covered by hair,
    Nicked by tech #FTW
    Burma Shave

    This is an important story, beyond the troll.
    A political party supporting liberty, where that is defined in part as the right to own all data pertaining to yourself, would see a great deal of support.
    And we can expect any of our entrenched parties to support liberty in 3. . .2. . .

    --
    Get thee glass eyes, and, like a scurvy politician, seem to see things thou dost not.--King Lear
  2. Re:Great! by greg1104 · · Score: 5, Insightful

    The minute you can pull data from every offshore bank account.

  3. One More Tool to Fight the Rise in Workers' Pay by Durrik · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I'm not being conspiracy nut in this. This is just one more tool that HR departments can use to keep pay low for people applying for work at a company. They always ask for what your current salary is. Before an applicant could lie and tell the HR department a higher number and get offered that higher number. Now they can just check this database and see what the number actually is.

    When I job switched in the past I've never been offered a number higher than what I currently made when I was truthful about my salary, and I screwed myself over. There was a time when I worked for a start-up and my salary was frozen for four years. When that job died I told my new employer what I was making and got offered a bit less since it was a rough job market. The raises I got at that job were less than inflation. The last time I switched I took my salary at the start of the previous job, ran it through the inflation calculator, added 10% and told that number to the new company. That was the number that I was offered, and they gave me some song and dance about it was a privilege about working in the industry when I tried to see if I could get it higher. So I got a 17% raise over my previous company.

    Now with this database that tactic is no longer viable. And if you don't tell them the current number you're making and then check it out, they can mark you as dishonest. Kind of hypocritical if you ask me.

    --
    Software Engineer & Writer of Military Science Fiction and Fantasy Blog: petermwright.com Twitter: WrightPeterM
    1. Re:One More Tool to Fight the Rise in Workers' Pay by MickyTheIdiot · · Score: 5, Insightful

      A fine solution if you don't have to eat.

  4. Re:To play devil's advocate... by SJHillman · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Having worked with my company's HR dept recently to fix a glitch with printing out payroll info, they are extremely paranoid about preventing other employees from seeing anyone's salary. However, the paranoia seems to be limited to preventing employees from seeing what each other makes rather than preventing any third party from accessing it.

  5. Re:Great! by MickyTheIdiot · · Score: 5, Insightful

    CEOs don't get big pay because of "market forces."

    They get big pay because their buddies sit on their board. These CEOs also sit on THEIR buddies boards. They vote each other big packages. If YOU want a big pay package are you going to vote down a big pay package for one of your buddies?