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Work profile, akin to credit score?
I was scrolling through Tildes a while ago when I can across a comment talking about how employers fed data into a credit-bureau-esque application that they could check to see things like your past salary data. Unfortunately, I can’t find that comment anymore. Does anyone know what it was, or where to find it?
I find the concept to be incredibly worrying, especially as it seems like unregulated technology or at the very least operating in a gray area carved out by existing credit reporting.
(Please let me know if this should go in ~misc or somewhere else. Wasn’t sure where to put it!)
The Work Number is probably what you’re looking for - it’s even owned by Equifax! Just like a credit score, you can restrict access to your file if you contact them and go through their arcane process.
YES this was it. Thank you!
Love to know that this is in the hands of a company that’s already shown how careless they are with data.
Ugh - Equifax of the egregious 2017 data breach.
Just wait until there's algorithmic/AI logic applied to finding the lowest salaried matching candidate for a given job title. This will not end well.
I work for an employment screening company (we call to verify employment history), and people would probably be shocked at how ubiquitous TWN is. There are a few other alternative companies that fill a similar role, but the next biggest as far as I know is called Thomas & Company, and we don't get directed to them anywhere near as often.
As I understand it, companies require your consent (through a "key" you generate) to see your salary history on TWN. Still not ideal, but they can't just pull your history without you knowing and actively consenting to it.
I think that’s only for people who explicitly opt out by sending a request to TWN, which I was given instructions on how to do after leaving an employer. It involved using credentials specific to that company).
From their website:
I had actually contacted TWN before to check if they had files on me, and they claimed they didn’t. After doing the opt-out, they sent my file and it contained records from a previous employer-from before I asked about my file.
Also from the website:
Technically, salary information requires a "salary key" which the consumer needs to generate:
I think you're right about the general employment history though; as I understand it, by default, they require your explicit consent to get salary details.
I find myself skeptical of this, simply because I don’t know that I or anyone else I know even knew that this existed. If people were getting asked it would be viral on TikTok by now.
I feel like there’s probably something buried in the “you give us the right to verify and background check you” that are conditions of employment that let them skate past this.
Sure, that's reasonable. I don't exactly have a lot of trust in Equifax either. But all that I can tell of their public policy suggests that they don't give out the salary information freely, and I suspect that if they did, there would be another PR disaster on-hand and likely a very easy class action ("I got a job and they paid me less because they got my salary history; you owe me the difference!"). So they have reason to go by their word here.
I suppose as a follow up: this feels like a really sneaky way to get around laws, that prevent employers from asking about previous wages.
I wonder how salary transparency laws will impact this too. If I make 70k, but I’m a candidate for a position with a posted range of 110-130k, would they disqualify me? Try to offer me less? Unscrupulous employers hardly need reasons to be shady.
I've been lying to glassdoor and linked-in for years telling them far less than I actually make.
When you word it this way, I'm going to have to start lying to them, and telling them way more than I actually make.
Just curious, why would you tell glassdoor you make less? You're making it harder for other people in your role to get paid what they're worth via market negotiations
You are right. I had never thought it through. Previously my only thought was to not tell them the truth.
Also, I apologize to the world for my sins
Unfortunately The Work Number gets its data directly from your HR department, or from payroll (ADP is a partner with them). I believe your employer can opt out - all but one of my employers that have used ADP have been on my TWN transcript.
The work number is how my work verifies employment
I use levels.fyi as a negotiating baseline, I’ve always kind of wondered if people inflate their salaries as a quasi-collective pay boost effort. Why have you preferred to deflate?
I'm grateful for the levels.fyi recommendation, thank you. I'm not searching for myself, but for friends and family who've had hard-to-characterize positions and are not sure how to translate their job titles or value their roles. This is a terrific resource for their job searches.
In 2006 I took a law school elective covering data privacy law in the US. At least at that time, most laws were written to regulate what the government could do with your data. Medical privacy is the clear exception but generally speaking corporate use of data was unregulated at that time.
I’m reasonably sure it’s still unregulated, based on the cavalier way most companies handle data. Except maybe in the EU.