Welcome to Skatteforsk – Centre for Tax Research’s November seminar!
In the second seminar this autumn we are excited to receive Simone Traini, associate professor of accounting at the Norwegian School of Economics (NHH) and an affiliated researcher at the Norwegian Centre for Taxation (NoCeT). He will present the paper “Closing the Blinds on Peeping Tom: The Effects of De-Anonymizing Searches in Public Tax Records on Firms’ Pay Dispersion, Employee Turnover, and Labor Cost"
The seminar is open and everyone is welcome to join!
Time: Thursday 9th of November, 11:15-12:00. Place: T451, Tower building. Contact person: Eivind Bjørkås (eivind.bjorkas@nmbu.no)
Abstract
This paper investigates how a policy change aimed at discouraging excessive pay comparisons affected firms' pay dispersion, labor cost, and employee turnover. In 2014, the previously anonymous system disclosing all Norwegians' taxable income was modified so that individuals would be notified about who looked up their information. We use matched employer-employee register data from 2010 to 2017 and estimate firms’ salary dispersion within occupational codes, turnover rates, and labor costs. We argue that this policy change imposed a social cost on salary comparisons, effectively reducing pay transparency and allowing firms to increase salary differences among employees. We employed a diff-in-diff design, comparing private sector firms with public sector firms exempt from the change (public sector employees' salary information remains exempt from this rule and can still be accessed anonymously through other channels).
Our empirical analysis reveals that de-anonymizing the tax list resulted in a decrease of about 90 percent in search volume, an increase in private firms' salary dispersion, and reductions in both turnover rates and labor costs. The reduction in labor costs indicates that firms can better differentiate their employees’ salaries to their advantage. Our findings further highlight the significant effects of a seemingly small change in the choice environment for salary searches on labor market outcomes.
It It is also possible to join the seminar online, via Teams, by using this link. Meeting ID: 340 225 510 372
Passcode: 9oECR8
Skatteforsk - Centre for Tax Research ble tildelt 30 millioner kroner av Norges forskningsråd i 2023 og er en del av NMBU Handelshøyskolen.Skatteforsk forsker på spørsmål rundt skatt og aktørers adferd. Målet er å levere forskning som holder høy internasjonal standard og bidra til en kunnskapsbasert samfunnsdebatt. Vi har forskere fra ti land: Norge, Danmark, Sverige, Finland, Storbritannia, Irland, Frankrike, Tyskland, Belgia, USA, Japan og Israel.