[danamit]

The HUGE influx of recruiters from developed countries that wanna go thru the whole recruitment process without giving me a a range of salary.

The confrontational and accusatory tone when I state my desired range and say that I got paid similar with companies in my own country (when questioned about it) when comparing apples to apples (contracting), the gaslighting and excuses of why I should get paid less than I have got with local and international companies in the past. The reasons for such aggression normally is the frustration since they have a GOOD monetary incentive to seal the deal, but does not excuse the behavior for sure. Even telemarketers are nicer than recruiters at this point.

I do attribute this to the rise in remote work. I used to rarely get contracted by a recruiter before C19 and when in the rare occasion when it happened it had a good chance of getting something out of it, now it is companies looking for super cheap labor instead of just trying to find talent.

[valbaca]

Fantastically put and exactly the same experience I've had.

They're entirely preying on the "talking about money is taboo" that exists in our culture and it only ever benefits them. We have to all collectively (or through the passage of laws like in CO, WA, CA) draw a hard line and the sand and not give any recruiter 15 minutes or even 1.5 minutes before they provide a salary range.

[BizarroLand]

It's really a nicety for them.

It saves them time so they can move on to the next target who may be more likely to give up a full time 6 figure salaried position with PTO and healthcare to take a contract job that requires a BS degree and 5 years of experience but only pays 150% of minimum wage, no PTO and no healthcare.

I get past the introductions and then say straight up, if this position doesn't consider mid 6 figures +/- $20,000 as its pay range then I probably won't be a good fit for it, and add $20,000 to that if it's not a direct hire.

They typically respond with, "We were hoping to pay more like $40,000" every time. I'm sure you were, but you need someone with an AA degree for that. With a BS they can make more, hell with a HS diploma they can make $40,000 a year working at a gas station. That's not even $20/hr. This is IT. You don't get to hire under $25/hr in a major city without either exploiting the newbies or tripping over the desperate.