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Massachusetts Bans Employers from Asking Applicants About Previous Pay

nytimes.com

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Re: Massachusetts Bans Employers from Asking Applicants About Previous Pay

#491

Post by eru »

crdoconnor wrote: post #139
slg wrote: post #125

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My post had the condition of "competent developer". There are certainly some developers that aren't competent. In my experience those developers get weeded out of the industry relatively quickly. This cuts off the bottom of the bell curve leaving most most developers with something close to an average skill set or above. I also won't discount the frictional costs of changing teams. If you take two identical developer…

"There are certainly some developers that aren't competent. In my experience those developers get weeded out of the industry relatively quickly." That gave me a chuckle.

If you define competence as being able to hold down a job..

(Though, of course, some social intelligence goes a long way. No need to actually know how to code.)

Re: Massachusetts Bans Employers from Asking Applicants About Previous Pay

#492

Post by eru »

serge2k wrote: post #265
jonknee wrote: post #121

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In Silicon Valley it seems popular to just start your own company and capture the value that way, but other fields have solved this issue by unionizing.

> other fields have solved this issue by unionizing careful with the "U word" around here. We don't need no stinkin unions, or any sort of professional association. I mean sure we don't get OT and too frequently get asked to be in a hellish oncall rotation or some 80 hour a week death march. We like it that way and we don't want to do anything to change it!

Just say No. If they fire you, just change companies.

No need to accept these conditions. Eg Google and Facebook are always hiring and treat their employees better than that.

(And I don't really see why I would want to join an organization and throw in my lot with people who are not smart enough to take above remedy.)

Re: Massachusetts Bans Employers from Asking Applicants About Previous Pay

#493

Post by nkurz »

st3v3r wrote: post #411
cheald wrote: post #172

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Every employment position comes with some degree of risk exposure. But, the risk of "I might lose my job" is quite a lot less scary than "I might lose all my invested capital and/or be stuck with crippling debts after the company crumbles". Early-stage startup employees are given greater compensation packages than later-stage employees specifically because of the greater risk of going to work for an early-stage start…

"Every employment position comes with some degree of risk exposure. But, the risk of "I might lose my job" is quite a lot less scary than "I might lose all my invested capital and/or be stuck with crippling debts after the company crumbles". " That doesn't happen. The company has those debts. Not the individual. "Early-stage startup employees are given greater compensation packages than later-stage employees specific…

That doesn't happen. The company has those debts. Not the individual.

In certain industries, in certain places, this is possible. For tech businesses in the US, it might even be the norm. But it is far from universal. My food business failed 3 years ago, and despite being an LLC, I'm still personally liable for brick and mortar leases, business loans, credit card debt, unpaid taxes, and outstanding invoices from suppliers. On good days I think I might get past this and be a member of society again, but this seems far from certain. You are welcome to argue that with better risk management this would not be the case, but your blanket statement "That doesn't happen" is false and offensive.

Re: Massachusetts Bans Employers from Asking Applicants About Previous Pay

#494

Post by eru »

st3v3r wrote: post #406
slg wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am a developer, so I am all for higher developer salaries, but your posts shows a common misunderstanding about economics. The value someone creates has nothing to do with their salary. Their salary is dictated by how many people need to hire developers and how many developers exist to fill those jobs or in simple terms, supply and demand. I might create millions of dollars in value with my code, but there might be…

I can't agree with that. For most people, the salary is dictated by how good they are at negotiating, and how strong their ability is to walk away. Two things that are completely unrelated to their ability to do the job, and as such, should have nothing to do with the employment process.

Those factors are hugely important. But you'd be hard pressed to get more out of a company than you provide in value to them, even with the best negotiation.

(Unless you are going to work for fools..)

Re: Massachusetts Bans Employers from Asking Applicants About Previous Pay

#495

Post by eru »

cloudjacker wrote: post #105
slg wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am a developer, so I am all for higher developer salaries, but your posts shows a common misunderstanding about economics. The value someone creates has nothing to do with their salary. Their salary is dictated by how many people need to hire developers and how many developers exist to fill those jobs or in simple terms, supply and demand. I might create millions of dollars in value with my code, but there might be…

I disagree, there was a time when the finance community similarly valued themselves with the broader market until some people realized the numeric dollar value they could create. And the rest is history. Its time for software engineers to collectively realize their expanding relevance to value creation in actual numeric value.

Why collectively? Did the finance people need anything collective?

Re: Massachusetts Bans Employers from Asking Applicants About Previous Pay

#496

Post by thavalai »

knd775 wrote: post #331
IshKebab wrote: post #305

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not anymore!

At least, not in Massachusetts.

I got excited about this, as I live in MA and seriously considering a change, until I read the part that it doesn't go into effect until July 2018.

Re: Massachusetts Bans Employers from Asking Applicants About Previous Pay

#497

Post by eru »

wildmusings wrote: post #96
revelation wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Assuming perfect information , yes, "supply and demand". Since you are so eager to offhand dismiss people, you can now research that one condition you conveniently left out.

> Assuming perfect information, yes, "supply and demand". Since you are so eager to offhand dismiss people, you can now research that one condition you conveniently left out. There's plenty of information about salaries at software companies floating around. Everyone knows (or could know with a quick search) what the salary for each level at the big tech firms are, as well as what the typical pay at startups is.

It's a bit harder to do for a fresh grad in the middle of nowhere that's not already in Silicon Valley or even the same continent.

However the information problem for employees isn't actually all that bad, as you say. The problem for employers trying to figure out whether people can actually perform is much, much harder. (But luckily they can usually diversify their bets amongst more than one employee.)

Re: Massachusetts Bans Employers from Asking Applicants About Previous Pay

#498

Post by eru »

hx87 wrote: post #243
cheald wrote: post #122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Consider that practically every company begins as a democratic worker-owned cooperative, and those worker-owners generally can't wait to diversify themselves out of that position. Risk exposure is a lot higher when you're a worker-owner, and most people are horribly risk-adverse. Ignoring the risk factor in the equation leads to some rather wrong conclusions.

> most people are horribly risk-adverse Free market socialism (i.e. a large UBI + single payer healthcare + low regulation) would largely mitigate that risk aversion, especially when combined with low levels of personal debt, since if you fail you can always count on decent healthcare and the UBI check.

That can work fairly well. If you finance the government largesse with a land value tax, you can even untax capital and labour and remove almost all distortions to the economy.

Re: Massachusetts Bans Employers from Asking Applicants About Previous Pay

#499

Post by johnnyhillbilly »

gozur88 wrote: post #463
andrepd wrote: post #444

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I know what you mean. It's the current system that's messed up, that just by holding money you can create money. It generates all kinds of fucked up inequalities.

You can't create money by holding money. You create money by risking money. There's a huge difference between the two.

You create money by borrowing. You win money by risking money(). You earn money by being useful in what you do.

) In Icelandic, "win" means "work".

Re: Massachusetts Bans Employers from Asking Applicants About Previous Pay

#500

Post by eru »

zenlikethat wrote: post #40
markonthewall wrote: post #11

I love the US and California, the tech scene is amazing and I was lucky to met such talented and friendly people in about every place I worked... from very large tech cos to "garage" startups. Which is why it pains me to see that so many engineers get stuck with such ridiculous salaries (relative to the value and wealth they provide and create). Problem is that some salaries are seemingly high compared to what the av…

In order for this to happen programmers have to: (1) Stop shaming each other for being "greedy" when they actually ask for what they merit. I can't tell you how many times on HN and elsewhere I've run into extremely defeatist attitude about this implying that we should be happy just to have jobs in the field. As long as these folks are around shaming fellow engineers for asking for more money they will drag everyone…

The chasers will only drag your salary down, if the business can't distinguish you from them when hiring. Luckily, it's pretty easy for you to signal that you are not a chaser.

Getting paid more than other folks mostly means you are better at interviewing and negotiations. (Or, if you are a lifer, that you are good at your company's promotion process. If your company is sane, that might even imply something about how well you work.)

I don't think shaming or not makes a difference. It's just irrelevant. (Or are people really going to ask for less in their next negotiations because someone on the Internet 'shamed' them? Really?)

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