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Know your rights

Your income and employment data 
belongs to you

Whether you’re an employee, a gig worker, an HR team, or a service provider that verifies income — the law is clear about who controls income and employment data, and who gets to share it. Here’s what that means, in plain language.
Consumers own their personal data, and are entitled to access it in portable and readily usable formats.”
State Privacy Laws
·
California Consumer Privacy Act
The short version

Three rights, protected by law

These aren’t Argyle’s rules — they come from federal and state statutes, regulatory guidance, and consumer privacy law. We’ve summarized the key protections below.

①

Right to disclose

You can discuss, share, and disclose your own wage and income information. Employers generally cannot stop you, penalize you, or require you to sign that right away.
➁

Right to access

You can request your own income and employment data electronically, in a format you can actually use — not locked away in a system you can’t reach.
➂

Right to authorize 
a provider

You can direct an authorized agent, like Argyle, to retrieve and deliver that data on your behalf, quickly and securely, wherever you need it.
Right to disclose

Can my employer stop me from sharing my income information?

No. Two kinds of state laws protect this directly. Wage transparency laws (in states including California, Colorado, Maryland, Nevada, Rhode Island, and Connecticut) require employers to share pay ranges with applicants and employees. Pay secrecy laws go further, guaranteeing your right to discuss or disclose your own wages — and another worker's — without retaliation.

At the federal level, the National Labor Relations Act protects employees who discuss wages as part of "concerted activity," and a 2014 executive order bars federal contractors from retaliating against workers who talk about their pay.

Employers — and by extension, their payroll or HR service providers — cannot claim your income information is confidential company property when you're the one choosing to share it.

Wage transparency laws
·
Pay secrecy laws
·
National  Labor Relations Act
·
Executive Order  11246
No employer shall prohibit an employee from inquiring about, discussing, or disclosing the wages of such employee or another employee… or retaliate against an employee who engages in such activities.”
Rhode Island pay secrecy law, 28 R.I. Gen. Laws Ann. § 28-6-18 (whitepaper, p.3–4)
Gig & independent workers

Do gig workers have the same rights?

Yes. Federal enforcers have made clear that gig workers deserve the same protections as traditional employees when it comes to sharing and accessing income data — even though gig platforms sometimes classify workers in ways that limit other employment protections.

Claims that a gig platform’s income data is proprietary or off-limits to the worker it belongs to don’t hold up under current federal guidance.

Being classified as an independent contractor doesn’t waive your right to share income information or organize around fair pay. The FTC has said it will use its full enforcement authority to prevent unfair practices affecting gig workers, regardless of how a company classifies them.”
FTC Policy Statement on Enforcement Related to Gig Work, Sept. 15, 2022 (whitepaper, p.5)
Right to access & portability

Can I get a copy of my own payroll data?

Yes. Section 1033 of the Dodd-Frank Act gives the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau authority to require companies that collect, analyze, maintain, or provide financial account information — including payroll providers and gig platforms — to share that data with consumers and with services consumers authorize, like Argyle.

State privacy laws add another layer: For example, California’s CCPA guarantees a right to receive personal data in a portable, usable format — with no carve-out for employment or gig-work data. And consumers’ rights to data portability is otherwise broadly recognized in state-level data privacy laws, including those in Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Indiana, Iowa, Montana, Oregon, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, and Virginia all.

Dodd-Frank § 1033
·
CCPA / CPRA
·
12+ state privacy laws
Businesses must… deliver the consumer’s information electronically in a portable, readily usable format that allows the consumer to transmit this information to another entity without hindrance.”
California Consumer Privacy Act, as amended (whitepaper, p.8)
Who this matters to

What this means for you

These protections apply a little differently depending on where you sit.

Consumers & workers

You control your own income and employment data. You can discuss your pay, request your records, and choose to share them with a lender, landlord, or background check company through a tool like Argyle — without needing your employer's permission.

Employers & HR teams

Wage secrecy policies and blanket confidentiality clauses covering pay discussions are largely unenforceable. Supporting employee-authorized data sharing (rather than blocking it) keeps you aligned with wage transparency, pay secrecy, and data portability obligations.

Service providers

Service providers such as mortgage lenders, tenant screeners, and government agencies that use consumer-directed data through Argyle are operating within a framework that federal and state law actively supports and encourages.
FAQ

Answers to your frequently asked questions

Can my employer fire or punish me for discussing my pay?
Is my income information my employer's trade secret?
I'm a 1099 contractor or gig worker. Do these rights still apply to me?
What is Section 1033 of Dodd-Frank, in plain terms?
Is this legal advice?
Explore all FAQs
For the detail-oriented

Legal resources & citations

The plain-language summaries above are drawn from the sources below.

  • Wage transparency & pay secrecy laws
    Cal. Lab. Code § 432.3; Colo. Rev. Stat. § 8-5-201; Md. Code Lab. & Empl. § 3-304.2; Nev. Rev. Stat. § 613.133; 28 R.I. Gen. Laws § 28-6-22; Conn. Gen. Stat. § 31-40z
  • National Labor Relations Act
    Section 7 concerted-activity protections; Ne. Land Servs., Ltd., 352 NLRB 744 (2008)
  • Executive Order 11246 (2014 amendment)
    Non-Retaliation for Disclosure of Compensation Information
  • FTC Policy Statement on Gig Work
    Federal Trade Commission, Sept. 15, 2022
  • Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform Act
    Section 1033, 12 U.S.C. § 5481
  • California Consumer Privacy Act
    Cal. Civ. Code §§ 1798.100–199, as amended by CPRA

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