After an semi extensive search didnt deliver any results, i had to start a topic. Was discussing your salary always a taboo in the western world? If not, when did discussing your salary with other people become a taboo?
The question is scientifically relevant because cultural changes are said to change the people's opinion on this topic, and popular media has commented on this topic that millenials are having much less difficulty sharing their income with their peers than previous generations. (Sources below) link
But there is no background information on why this is become the norm and what started this behavior. As discussing your salary may close the male-female wage gap and increase honesty within the payment structure of the companies, this question has societal relevance as well.
The focus on the western world is mainly because of the availability of knowledge on the US, as well as the need to focus on a specific geographic and cultural part of the world to control for other variables like culture in other parts of the world. If any of you have extensive knowledge on this topic, but its culturally or geographically divergent from the RQ above, any knowledge is welcome.
Thank you for your time.
It’s not a taboo in “the western world.” Salary is freely discussed in Germany because it’s usually not a secret. Many industries in a lot of Western European countries have published lists of salary scales that anybody can access and look at. I can look up my former professor’s salaries in Germany for example because I know their “rank” (for example, university-professor as opposed to regular professor) and roughly how many years they have been a professor.
Perhaps by “western” you mean “US.”