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Business Daily: The Joy of 9 to 5: Pay

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The Joy of 9 to 5: Pay

31/12/2015 GMT

BBC World Service - Business Daily, The Joy of 9 to 5: Pay

The persistent taboo over how much we earn and is there a fairer way to distribute pay?

Lucy Kellaway investigates the persistent taboo over salaries, and asks who benefits from this secrecy. What we are paid is rarely a meritocracy. Studies show that if you are taller, more attractive, have better hair, you are likely to take home a bigger pay packet. Even the most popular way of rewarding extra effort at work - performance related pay - has been shown to demotivate and demoralise workers.

Lucy steps inside at a broad range of offices to investigate - from Suma Wholefoods in Halifax in the UK where all 200 employees, whether driving a forklift or trading commodities, earns exactly the same amount, to Gravity Payments, where the CEO has just cut his million dollar salary to fund his promise that no employee will earn less than $70,000.

Speaking to workers and business leaders, Lucy asks whether there is a fairer way of cutting up the cake.

(Photo: Secreted cash. Credit: Fuse/Thinkstock)

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