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But at Fortune\u2018s Workplace Innovation Summit in Atlanta on Tuesday, a pay transparency CEO and a viral content creator who have spent years working on the issue both said that the problem isn\u2019t companies not sharing pay, it\u2019s that they can\u2019t explain it.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf companies were merely consistent with the things they say they care about in their pay philosophy, and what they actually pay in the execution of offers, merit, promotions, transfers, the pay gap would basically be eradicated,\u201d Maria Colacurcio, CEO of pay equity software company Syndio, told the audience.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The disconnect, she said, isn\u2019t intentional, but it still has consequences. HR and compensation teams spend months building thoughtful strategies. But then \u201cthat strategy hits the wild wild west,\u201d when recruiters are trying to land candidates and managers are making last-minute retention plays. Merit increases also often go to whoever is loudest, not necessarily whoever performed best.<\/p>\n
\u201cAll of that thoughtful strategy goes out the window, because all these daily decisions are just completely ungoverned, and so the output of that is where we end up [being] inconsistent,\u201d Colacurcio said.\u00a0Those inconsistencies show up as pay decisions that drift from stated values, and employees that can\u2019t get a straight answer about why they earn what they earn.<\/p>\n
Hannah Williams, the founder of Salary Transparent Street, has built a viral media platform asking strangers on the street what their salaries are, whether they think they earn enough, and why they make what they make.\u00a0<\/p>\n
But with all of her experience talking to everyday people, most people can\u2019t answer that last question.<\/p>\n
\u201cAre people able to articulate why they make the salaries that they make? Absolutely not,\u201d she said at the Fortune Workplace Innovation Summit. \u201cWhen I ask them, do you know why you make what you make, they\u2019re like, \u2018what?\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n
Is the gender pay gap getting worse in 2026?<\/p>\n
The conversation, moderated by Fortune Senior Features Editor Indrani Sen, landed at a moment when pay is actually moving in the wrong direction.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Women\u2019s earnings barely rose in 2024, while male earnings increased 3.7%, according to the most recent U.S. Census Bureau report. Women working full-time, on average, earned 80.9% of what men earned that year, down from 82.7% in 2023. It\u2019s the second consecutive year the gap has grown, despite the spread of pay transparency laws to states including New York, California, and Colorado.<\/p>\n
Meanwhile, six in 10 women say men have more opportunities when it comes to earning competitive wages, according to a 2026 survey from The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research.<\/p>\n
In Europe, an even bigger change is coming. The EU Pay Transparency Directive takes effect on June 7, giving employees in member states the right to request the median salary of colleagues of the opposite gender doing comparable work. Colacurcio said the directive will \u201ccrack this nut wide open\u201d for global employers who haven\u2019t yet built the infrastructure to defend their own pay decisions.<\/p>\n
To be sure, \u201cit\u2019s not unlawful to pay people differently if you\u2019re looking legally, and for a company it\u2019s not bad comp practice to pay people differently,\u201d Colacurcio said. \u201cYou just have to have a philosophy and a strategy as to what you value.\u201d<\/p>\n
But when workers can\u2019t get answers to their questions about pay, Williams said, it can breed the kind of resentment that transparency was supposed to solve.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cIf you find out Greg makes 100k more, and there\u2019s anger, that\u2019s a clear demonstration that people don\u2019t understand why they\u2019re paid what they\u2019re paid,\u201d she said. \u201cIt\u2019s really important in the hiring process to clearly communicate how pay is determined and explain why people are paid what they\u2019re paid so that that disgruntlement doesn\u2019t happen.\u201d<\/p>\n
Colacurcio, as CEO of a pay transparency company, reports three numbers annually: pay equity (whether people doing similar work are paid similarly regardless of gender or race), the pay gap (which reflects representation and movement up the ladder), and the CEO pay ratio.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s really important to stay committed to pay transparency, even when the numbers don\u2019t look great,\u201d she said. \u201cSome years it\u2019s painful, and some years it\u2019s not painful.\u201d<\/p>\n
AI complications and the taboo of talking salaries<\/p>\n
AI has also made pay equity and transparency more challenging, the panelists said.<\/p>\n
Companies are racing to put a premium on AI skills, but most can\u2019t yet define what an AI skill is or how to verify it. Without governance, Colacurcio warned, employers will have \u201ca really hard time differentiating between what\u2019s real and what\u2019s not real.\u201d That only creates the next set of unexplainable pay decisions.<\/p>\n
Williams, who quit her data analyst job in 2022 after discovering she was underpaid and doubled her salary on the next offer, also said an older generation\u2019s reluctance to talk about money and salaries publicly is a challenge. \u201cIt\u2019s what we\u2019ve been spoon fed for decades,\u201d Williams said. \u201cDon\u2019t talk about your pay, don\u2019t rock the boat, don\u2019t get in trouble.\u201d But she pointed out that under the National Labor Relations Act, it\u2019s a protected right.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe can learn how our experiences have shaped each other and how we can help each other,\u201d she said. \u201cI think it\u2019s important to come to the table with a lot of empathy, take it slow, [and] provide transparency.\u201d<\/p>\n
#Pay #transparency #exposing #big #problem #companies #explain #pay #pay<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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