Colorado has passed legislation around this, so we'll have a test case soon.
> The Guidance makes clear that employers must disclose compensation and employee benefits information in each job posting for (i) positions that are to be performed in Colorado, or (ii) remote positions that could be performed in Colorado.
My employer posts salary for all positions and for me its been net negative. I was always aware that my odds of getting more money are low, but now seeing how much (and little) others are compensated makes me feel worse about my job. It will be very nice when applying for jobs, but has created a lot of frustration for me.
I'd just point out that this is largely a cultural phenomenon. In some countries it is normal to post everyone's salary (similarly, student grades are posted on the wall after exams).
A lack of transparency really only aids the employer (after all, the employer knows what everyone makes, and with salary comparison services they know exactly how competitive their salaries are).
To me, this sounds like a net negative in the same way that going to the dentist for a checkup reveals you have cavities. The root cause ( sorry) seems to be that your employer plays favorites, not that they reveal the fact they play favorites by being transparent.
It already exists and is called Austria. The effect is that every job advertisement since 2011 says:
"The minimum salary amounts to xxxx € according to law/ordinance/collective labour agreement. According to candidate's skill set a recompense higher than that is possible."
The first sentence is mandatory. The second is not, but has become a stable trope.
Question for HN readers: do you think this is useful? Why/why not?
"the hourly or salary compensation, or a range thereof"
That's something of a loophole, though it often ends in an awkward standoff where the company has to explain why it offered you something other than the top of the range.
Is this not a good thing? It lets you see that you are being underpaid and allows you to negotiate from that position (or accept that you don’t think you’re worth what newer hires are.) I honestly don’t see a downside.
Very interesting thank you. This seems to have only partial compliance so far. If I do a search on a random location specific job board I'm seeing some companies with salary bands and some without. Datadog, for example, does not have the band listed where Xero and Snapdocs do.
While it is interesting that your experience has been negative, I would be curious to know how many people in your company look at this information in a positive light and have put it to work to their advantage.
I don't mean to minimize your struggles, but perhaps this is a case where the exception should not be the rule? Do the benefits to the people positively impacted outweigh the loss to the people negatively impacted?
I recently stopped ignoring recruiters but I instead respond to say "thanks for reaching out, I'm actively looking, but if I'm going to invest the time in learning more about the opportunity, can you tell me the salary range for the position? I need to know if I can afford to take the role"
Most of the time they give a range.
Even if I wasn't looking, I'd have picked up valuable market insight.
I simply tell recruiters what my current going rate is, and most of them leave me alone after that. This is great for separating the wheat from the chaff.
I do the same. I won't take a call from recruiters until they tell me the company name and salary range. Both are like pulling teeth with some of the shitty recruiters out there! I'm pretty happy with my good mission, fairly cushy, well paid role, so it'd take a significant pay bump for me to consider leaving, and we're wasting both of our (but mostly my) time if the role won't give me the salary I'd want.
My first response to any recruiter is always asking for the compensation range. Recruiters have reached out with insanely varying ranges. The best was one day where I was offered one opportunity for $80k-$90k and another for $350k-$600k (different recruiters).
This is one of the main benefits to the candidate of a recruiter. They tell you what the salary is, and they know it because their pay for placing you is tied to it. It also allows them to decide whether you're worth putting forward, or whether there might be some other role they can place you for.
I do that too. It works most of the time, but sometimes they would reply "what salary are you currently on?", if they do then I either ignore them or I reply that I don't think it's relevant or I that don't feel comfortable answering that question.
I mean, it depends what market you're in. If you're desperate for the job, maybe you should reveal your salary (and bump it a bit?)
Twice in the past 5 years I interviewed at companies which did “salary leveling” to make sure that there was no discrimination in salaries (moz and zoom). Salaries were all published to prevent gender / age / race discrimination.
Both were about 20% below all of my other offers, if I livdd in the usa. Worse still, I expect make a San Francisco salary working remotely from other countries. They were both shocked when I laughed out loud when their offers were based on the country where I live rather than USA where I pay my taxes.
I’m all for equality, but, fuck you, pay me. I work in tech for the money, nothing else. Cash rules everything around me.
Just a tip that I have used, take it or leave it. The US govt. publishes their pay scale openly and the level of experience for jobs that go with them. I say to the recruiter: "If I took this position with govt., I would get paid xty-thousand... And that's just bare minimum... That comes with insane levels of job security... Does this position offer that kind of security? No? Hmmm... also govt comes with crazy high pension benefits that you don't have... What do you think we should do to bring that number closer to market reality?"
Unfortunately the government matrix for programmers underpays entry level positions. For example, here’s an open entry level programming job open right now: http://usajobs.gov/GetJob/ViewDetails/599153100
But at least it’s out in the open, saves people time if they are expecting more then that.
> If you’re worried that your current staff will find out they’re underpaid, stop underpaying them
> There’s no excuse for not publishing a salary or salary range
There is nuance around what is competitive comp for different departments (eg. engineering vs customer support), and how current employees in the lower paid departments will perceive the difference in comp across departments. I am all for publishing salary ranges, but it doesn’t come for free, you will wind up with more ill feelings among team members in lower paid departments, even if you pay everyone market compensation. It’s probably still worth publishing salary ranges though, for all the reasons cited in the article, and that it saves everyone time.
That will never happen, unless some overreaching government makes it mandatory (e.g. CO). There are at least three reasons:
1) A candidate's expectation for salary might be lower than the advertised range, but if they see the range, they'll expect more money.
2) The company might be able to convince a good candidate to accept a salary below their expectations if they can sell the company and culture. These candidates won't apply if they see a range below their expectations.
3) It makes the company's salary ranges public, which little startups will use to create comparison websites, driving even more candidates away from smaller companies to the tech giants and monopolies who can afford to pay above market in order to kill their competition.
Overall, I'ld say it would be convenient at first, but a horrible idea in the long run if it's made mandatory. It should be up to individual businesses.
1) So what? In your example, the candidate doesn't know what the fair market salary is (precisely because these data aren't transparent now), but once they're hired and they find out, they'll instantly become unhappy and more likely to move. "they'll expect more money" == "employer won't be able to screw the employee over".
2) Oh these poor poor companies who won't be able to screw their employees out of their fair compensation.
3) Do you mean the startups that get crazy stupid valuations? Or those startups who pay peanuts and have little benefits? People already know the risk they're taking with the latter, and the former can afford to pay competitive salaries or sell the other benefits harder.
No, it should not be up to individual businesses. You are clearly comfortable with exploiting people for the benefit of the business.
If your business can't afford to pay for top talent, then perhaps it's ok if it doesn't get the top talent. Businesses should purchase what they can pay for, just like we do when we go to the store.
> A candidate's expectation for salary might be lower than the advertised range, but if they see the range, they'll expect more money.
A client expected price for a product might be higher than the advertised price, but if they see the price, they'll pay less.
I do not say this is a good idea, but I do not think it is obvious that this particular issue is a reason for it to fail. This is how selling products work so, why wouldn't it work for the job market?
> Overall, I'ld say it would be convenient at first, but a horrible idea in the long run if it's made mandatory. It should be up to individual businesses.
You start off saying it will never happen because unless it's mandatory. And you're probably right about that. That's why it should be mandatory.
Point 1 sounds like a great issue. People getting paid more sounds good.
Point 3 just means small companies will have to have some explicit additions to salary (profit sharing for established companies, more equity for smaller ones).
I don't know how to respond to your second point. What does "sell the company and culture" even mean? It's doing a mission you would accept a paycut to be at? Great, that's not hurt at all. It's a company with a lot of future growth? Great, spell out how (via equity or other ways) I participate in that growth. It's a fun place to work?
I do agree we would want some more compensation information than just a dollar sign. You offer free laundry and hanggliding on your lunch break?
Everyone who is interested in earning the most money (without the startup gamble) is already driven toward the top tech companies. Everyone in tech already knows (at least roughly) which companies are in a market apart from the rest.
You can list benefits alongside salary to try and make up for anything you want, but mandatory salary postings won't change anything except waste fewer people's time on interviews for offers they won't accept and make people working for too little money aware of the fact.
The problem the article is trying to solve is already solved.
Sites like Hired let people bid for you with salaries first.
Places like Glassdoor post salary ranges.
And all the companies I've worked for have had internal salary ranges for a position which cannot be negotiated around. Just because they aren't public, doesn't mean they don't exist. I had a job offer that was lower than my current salary but they wouldn't match my current salary since it was out of their range. And I'm a straight, white male.
A posted salary is good, a posted range better than nothing, but I'd personally rather see all salary information made public, with names attached.
I work for the University of California, so my salary is a matter of public record, along with all state employees. So be it. The sky hasn't fallen.
One big problem with making salary info public is that if it is one sided (some firms do this and others don't), it can place the firms that do make it public at a disadvantage. There are also some issues with the government forcing private firms to disclose this information.
At the very least, I'd say that any firm using the H1-B visa should be required to make all salaries public, not just salaries for H1-B hires. If you're going to claim that you can't hire (or retain) staff and need a special visa for this, let's see those numbers. I'm not saying I don't believe it, just that it's hard to take this seriously when they are very secretive about their own information but want the power to decide who is going to be permitted to live and work in the US and at what salary.
If you want to keep it private, that's fine, you just don't get the power to bestow temporary residency for the purposes of working for your firm.
The lemon-game bit at the end is correct. If you don't say what you want to pay people, they assume you don't want to pay them much, or that you don't want to tell your existing employees. So then the good people decide not to apply, and it takes longer to find someone.
There's a similar game theoretical game for the employee. You don't want to ask immediately because you'll seem greedy. But you also don't want to waste a bunch of time doing interviews and homework, only to find a booby prize at the end. So as long as there's enough firms that do publish a range, you're going to apply to them.
The article is not clear about whether this is in the companies interest or in the work forces interest. In some parts it sounds like it's better for the company, but an actual argument for that is missing. Most of the article demands it though so that women, people of color and other disadvantaged groups are less disadvantaged. It would have been more honest to be clear about it.
And it's not really honest either to just put the blame on the company. "I’m unlikely to bring up the topic of salary with a potential boss." Well, then change that. Before demanding something from a company that you would like to work for, start demanding something from yourself. It's basically the attitude "I have a problem, I could directly contribute to the solution, but I prefer ranting about that somebody else is not doing that for me."
I think a salary range should be provided to candidates once the employer decides to start the interview process. This would greatly reduce discovery abuse by other companies seeking that info for their own use/gain.
True, the candidate does not know initially when they first see the job posting (or are contacted by a recruiter) but most of the time/effort/hardwork is after getting someone to acknowlege your resume is a good fit.
If I see a job I am qualified for, and/or interested in, and I don't see a salary range I tend ignore it - I don't have time to entertain companies unwilling to be open about their payscales.
Alternatively companies can make an offer without asking for salary expectations. They know the market and their pay range, so it's not a large loss for them to do so.
To make sure expectations are in ballpark, use a confidential salary survey.
It would be a great idea to stop companies from taking advantage of people who might lowball themselves and take a lower offer just out of desperation to get a job.
"Nearly all" is definitely inaccurate. The sites you've linked to are collections of third-party recruiter ads which should be avoided by anyone who isn't completely desperate for a job.
Without transparency in salary ranges it will be very difficult to close the gap between white men and everyone else. It evens the field in negotiations and allows people who typically would not negotiate the ability to do so. Of course the downside would be the employer knowing your salary where you last worked, but that is often requested anyhow in my experience.
A Polish job board https://nofluffjobs.com took over the market in several years simply by forcing employers to include the range when posting the offer. So there is a supply/demand argument here - at least for some markets.
I was surprised to see that the article says that "straight white males" would be the beneficiary of continuing to fail to post salary ranges. I understand the white male part, but I don't understand the straight part.
The minority and underrepresented perspective is really important here.
But it takes a while to learn how to evaluate your skills against a particular company's needs, market at large and learn to negotiate. I know few people who were 'brought up [...] to stir the pot'. Talking to people, putting yourself out there, doing research and then finding a workable deal is not something that just comes as a given. But yes, privilege exists.
Having said that, in a competitive market a salary range simply makes a potential employer more trustworthy, and avoids wasting time for both parties.
[+] [-] soared|4 years ago|reply
> The Guidance makes clear that employers must disclose compensation and employee benefits information in each job posting for (i) positions that are to be performed in Colorado, or (ii) remote positions that could be performed in Colorado.
My employer posts salary for all positions and for me its been net negative. I was always aware that my odds of getting more money are low, but now seeing how much (and little) others are compensated makes me feel worse about my job. It will be very nice when applying for jobs, but has created a lot of frustration for me.
https://www.jdsupra.com/legalnews/colorado-releases-guidance...
[+] [-] hn_throwaway_99|4 years ago|reply
A lack of transparency really only aids the employer (after all, the employer knows what everyone makes, and with salary comparison services they know exactly how competitive their salaries are).
[+] [-] catlifeonmars|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] thebigspacefuck|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] bmn__|4 years ago|reply
It already exists and is called Austria. The effect is that every job advertisement since 2011 says:
"The minimum salary amounts to xxxx € according to law/ordinance/collective labour agreement. According to candidate's skill set a recompense higher than that is possible."
The first sentence is mandatory. The second is not, but has become a stable trope.
Question for HN readers: do you think this is useful? Why/why not?
[+] [-] tyingq|4 years ago|reply
That's something of a loophole, though it often ends in an awkward standoff where the company has to explain why it offered you something other than the top of the range.
[+] [-] edgyquant|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] fishywang|4 years ago|reply
This will be interesting. So if a company doesn't explicitly exclude Colorado from their remote job description this applies to them.
[+] [-] dan-robertson|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] iandanforth|4 years ago|reply
https://www.builtincolorado.com/jobs/dev-engineering
[+] [-] zelon88|4 years ago|reply
I don't mean to minimize your struggles, but perhaps this is a case where the exception should not be the rule? Do the benefits to the people positively impacted outweigh the loss to the people negatively impacted?
[+] [-] sorokod|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] jka|4 years ago|reply
Do you see any benefits in being able to compare your own salary and work output with those of your colleagues?
[+] [-] AlexC04|4 years ago|reply
Most of the time they give a range.
Even if I wasn't looking, I'd have picked up valuable market insight.
[+] [-] elric|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] servercobra|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] the_jeremy|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] lordnacho|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] ekzy|4 years ago|reply
I mean, it depends what market you're in. If you're desperate for the job, maybe you should reveal your salary (and bump it a bit?)
[+] [-] gr__or|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] NickGott|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] belatw|4 years ago|reply
Both were about 20% below all of my other offers, if I livdd in the usa. Worse still, I expect make a San Francisco salary working remotely from other countries. They were both shocked when I laughed out loud when their offers were based on the country where I live rather than USA where I pay my taxes.
I’m all for equality, but, fuck you, pay me. I work in tech for the money, nothing else. Cash rules everything around me.
[+] [-] dccoolgai|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] asperous|4 years ago|reply
But at least it’s out in the open, saves people time if they are expecting more then that.
[+] [-] brailsafe|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] lolinder|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] gkop|4 years ago|reply
> There’s no excuse for not publishing a salary or salary range
There is nuance around what is competitive comp for different departments (eg. engineering vs customer support), and how current employees in the lower paid departments will perceive the difference in comp across departments. I am all for publishing salary ranges, but it doesn’t come for free, you will wind up with more ill feelings among team members in lower paid departments, even if you pay everyone market compensation. It’s probably still worth publishing salary ranges though, for all the reasons cited in the article, and that it saves everyone time.
[+] [-] willmadden|4 years ago|reply
1) A candidate's expectation for salary might be lower than the advertised range, but if they see the range, they'll expect more money.
2) The company might be able to convince a good candidate to accept a salary below their expectations if they can sell the company and culture. These candidates won't apply if they see a range below their expectations.
3) It makes the company's salary ranges public, which little startups will use to create comparison websites, driving even more candidates away from smaller companies to the tech giants and monopolies who can afford to pay above market in order to kill their competition.
Overall, I'ld say it would be convenient at first, but a horrible idea in the long run if it's made mandatory. It should be up to individual businesses.
[+] [-] optymizer|4 years ago|reply
2) Oh these poor poor companies who won't be able to screw their employees out of their fair compensation.
3) Do you mean the startups that get crazy stupid valuations? Or those startups who pay peanuts and have little benefits? People already know the risk they're taking with the latter, and the former can afford to pay competitive salaries or sell the other benefits harder.
No, it should not be up to individual businesses. You are clearly comfortable with exploiting people for the benefit of the business.
If your business can't afford to pay for top talent, then perhaps it's ok if it doesn't get the top talent. Businesses should purchase what they can pay for, just like we do when we go to the store.
[+] [-] yiyus|4 years ago|reply
A client expected price for a product might be higher than the advertised price, but if they see the price, they'll pay less.
I do not say this is a good idea, but I do not think it is obvious that this particular issue is a reason for it to fail. This is how selling products work so, why wouldn't it work for the job market?
[+] [-] HWR_14|4 years ago|reply
You start off saying it will never happen because unless it's mandatory. And you're probably right about that. That's why it should be mandatory.
Point 1 sounds like a great issue. People getting paid more sounds good.
Point 3 just means small companies will have to have some explicit additions to salary (profit sharing for established companies, more equity for smaller ones).
I don't know how to respond to your second point. What does "sell the company and culture" even mean? It's doing a mission you would accept a paycut to be at? Great, that's not hurt at all. It's a company with a lot of future growth? Great, spell out how (via equity or other ways) I participate in that growth. It's a fun place to work?
I do agree we would want some more compensation information than just a dollar sign. You offer free laundry and hanggliding on your lunch break?
[+] [-] rootsofallevil|4 years ago|reply
Is there any point in applying for a job without a good idea that they can match your salary expectations?
[+] [-] the_jeremy|4 years ago|reply
You can list benefits alongside salary to try and make up for anything you want, but mandatory salary postings won't change anything except waste fewer people's time on interviews for offers they won't accept and make people working for too little money aware of the fact.
[+] [-] toomuchtodo|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] JaceLightning|4 years ago|reply
Sites like Hired let people bid for you with salaries first.
Places like Glassdoor post salary ranges.
And all the companies I've worked for have had internal salary ranges for a position which cannot be negotiated around. Just because they aren't public, doesn't mean they don't exist. I had a job offer that was lower than my current salary but they wouldn't match my current salary since it was out of their range. And I'm a straight, white male.
[+] [-] geebee|4 years ago|reply
I work for the University of California, so my salary is a matter of public record, along with all state employees. So be it. The sky hasn't fallen.
One big problem with making salary info public is that if it is one sided (some firms do this and others don't), it can place the firms that do make it public at a disadvantage. There are also some issues with the government forcing private firms to disclose this information.
At the very least, I'd say that any firm using the H1-B visa should be required to make all salaries public, not just salaries for H1-B hires. If you're going to claim that you can't hire (or retain) staff and need a special visa for this, let's see those numbers. I'm not saying I don't believe it, just that it's hard to take this seriously when they are very secretive about their own information but want the power to decide who is going to be permitted to live and work in the US and at what salary.
If you want to keep it private, that's fine, you just don't get the power to bestow temporary residency for the purposes of working for your firm.
[+] [-] lordnacho|4 years ago|reply
There's a similar game theoretical game for the employee. You don't want to ask immediately because you'll seem greedy. But you also don't want to waste a bunch of time doing interviews and homework, only to find a booby prize at the end. So as long as there's enough firms that do publish a range, you're going to apply to them.
[+] [-] ganafagol|4 years ago|reply
And it's not really honest either to just put the blame on the company. "I’m unlikely to bring up the topic of salary with a potential boss." Well, then change that. Before demanding something from a company that you would like to work for, start demanding something from yourself. It's basically the attitude "I have a problem, I could directly contribute to the solution, but I prefer ranting about that somebody else is not doing that for me."
[+] [-] beezle|4 years ago|reply
True, the candidate does not know initially when they first see the job posting (or are contacted by a recruiter) but most of the time/effort/hardwork is after getting someone to acknowlege your resume is a good fit.
[+] [-] theropost|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] savorypiano|4 years ago|reply
To make sure expectations are in ballpark, use a confidential salary survey.
https://payscope.io (I made this)
Why Employers Should Use Confidential Salary Surveys: https://payscope.io/blog/employers
[+] [-] mattbgates|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] yrgulation|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] beforeolives|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] unknown|4 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] SethMurphy|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] neilwilson|4 years ago|reply
However in the era of “more people than jobs” that has drifted away.
If you don’t value my time now then why is it going to be any different if I work for you?
Lack of salary and clarity on the role is an instant “not wasting my time with that” signal for me.
[+] [-] ellimilial|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] drdec|4 years ago|reply
Could someone enlighten me here?
[+] [-] ellimilial|4 years ago|reply
But it takes a while to learn how to evaluate your skills against a particular company's needs, market at large and learn to negotiate. I know few people who were 'brought up [...] to stir the pot'. Talking to people, putting yourself out there, doing research and then finding a workable deal is not something that just comes as a given. But yes, privilege exists.
Having said that, in a competitive market a salary range simply makes a potential employer more trustworthy, and avoids wasting time for both parties.