It's not that my employer forbids me to walk down the hall and tell someone what I make. I don't care if employees talk with each other about it.
I agree it's not the employers job to tell employees what other employees are making.
But, There's definitely a sense of taboo in society about discussing wages.
It gives employers leverage to have people in the dark about how much their coworkers are making.
Take my industry, for example.
When a shows gets sold to a network, the salaries for all employees are included in the contract. When the contract is written, the salary for each person of a certain position is presented at maximum compensation.
Now, if the production company can negotiate to pay you less than what they're getting from the network to pay you, that difference gets put into the pockets of the owners of the company.
Due the nature of this industry being predominantly freelance, the difference in what each employee is getting paid wildly varies from person to person.
It made me laugh when he bragged about getting all his information from AI.