Should all clubs

[Statto]

Disclosing very high wages only results in increasing the highest wages.

I'm sure the phenomenon you describe does occur to some extent but to suggest this is the only, or most significant, consequence of disclosure is an oversimplification, and I think wrong. Public scrutiny of bankers' salaries in the aftermath of the financial crisis led to their bonuses being capped by law. The requirement for PLC directors' salaries to be disclosed to and approved by shareholders acts as a downward force. So does scrutiny of high salaries in roles funded by the taxpayer, such as the big earners at the BBC. There's a reason the PM always earns a relatively low salary considering the job he does, and it's because a lower salary is more palatable for the electorate. He doesn't point to the President of the US and say "I want to be paid as much as him."

[The Rational Fan]

Disclosing very high wages only results in increasing the highest wages.

I'm sure the phenomenon you describe does occur to some extent but to suggest this is the only, or most significant, consequence of disclosure is an oversimplification, and I think wrong. Public scrutiny of bankers' salaries in the aftermath of the financial crisis led to their bonuses being capped by law. The requirement for PLC directors' salaries to be disclosed to and approved by shareholders acts as a downward force. So does scrutiny of high salaries in roles funded by the taxpayer, such as the big earners at the BBC. There's a reason the PM always earns a relatively low salary considering the job he does, and it's because a lower salary is more palatable for the electorate. He doesn't point to the President of the US and say "I want to be paid as much as him."

No doubt that my comments are a massive oversimplification as that is what statistics generally do. But, those that like to ignore statistics often think their situation will be the "exception to the statistical rule" for no good reason.

The most common outcome of disclosing salaries is to increase the salaries of the most valuable employees but if disclosure is part of a "complex multifaceted policy" it can work to reduce overpaid employees, especially if the expensive employees are very replaceable. As for PM's salaries, the PM is generally on a low salary because only about 35% of voters consider him valuable to the country, and he needs to convince the other undecided voters not to replace him.

Frankly, in football, the highest-paid players are generally extremely valuable to their team's income stream and as an example, Son/Kane could probably get more if their salaries and all the other salaries were disclosed. I really doubt Son and Kane are replaceable without Spurs spending a lot more money, salary disclosure will only make that clearer.

[Statto]

@TRF

Firstly, what/where are the statistics backing up your assertion that this is a "statistical rule"? I don't really see how such data could even exist. For the organisations I've mentioned (PLCs, public sector organisations, the BBC etc) what statistics could show that their top earners would be paid less if their salaries weren't publicly disclosed?

Secondly, regarding footballers, they all have agents, and most of their agents represent many other players and are part of a small, interconnected community. So I'm quite sure most players, through their agents, already know what their peers earn anyway. So making that information public won't really change anything in that regard.

[toshes mate]

Socialists in many countries thought it was a good idea to force companies to disclose their CEO salaries, in the hope it would curb insane the salaries of CEOs etc.

The evidence of the existence of wage/salary inflation via disclosure is not evidence of causation and it is the height of naivety to believe the salaries were not known about in the circles who wanted to know before politicians called for greater transparency.   What you quote is the kind of pure misinformation that was present at the time of the arguments about more exposure.  The increases happen regardless of transparency and unless the attitudes of the general public steadily move custom away from the high rollers to the more modest ones (which takes a long time) there is no known cause.  The increase in CEO wealth has probably been driven by size and power of companies which is driven as much by deregulation as much as anything else.  Read Adam Smith who has full books on how this happens.

[john dempsey]

 Who would of thought a small club like Fulham
and a lovely gentleman like Johnny Haynes would
unleash such avarice in the English game.

[blingo]

This isn't about salaries guys. My question was, do you think that TRANSFER fees should be disclosed. Salaries can always be added to in a mutitude of ways but what I want to know is simple, how much have we payed for a player and how much have we sold a player for.

[toshes mate]

In other words the question being asked is about what is added to/or lost from the kitty of the selling club after the contractural/registration changes have been negotiated and I don't see how you can get to a realistic figure without knowing details of both the contract being voided and the new contract being substituted for it which also contains the same detail as the voided contract e.g. players wages, signing fee, bonuses and charges for agency fees, etc.  There must even be negotiable costs involved for players who are out of contract and are notionally free transfers I would have thought and these will surely show up in profit and loss accounts.