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New York City bans employers from asking potential workers about past salary

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Re: New York City bans employers from asking potential workers about past salary

#191

Post by teej »

lend000 wrote: post #184

There's a case to be made for an employee protection preventing an employer from firing an employee for refusing to produce pay stubs from a past employer. However, I've said it before -- preventing a question from being asked is state overreach and constitutes a violation of the first amendment, in my opinion.

There are already loads of questions that employers aren't allowed to ask. Are you married? Are you pregnant? How many kids do you have? Is your significant other black? When was the last time you went to church? So, you're about 50, is that right?

Re: New York City bans employers from asking potential workers about past salary

#192

Post by fuzzybeard »

lend000 wrote: post #184

There's a case to be made for an employee protection preventing an employer from firing an employee for refusing to produce pay stubs from a past employer. However, I've said it before -- preventing a question from being asked is state overreach and constitutes a violation of the first amendment, in my opinion.

While it's a smart move not to disclose your prior salary during negotiations, I really don't want there to be legal implications for the back and forth during this process. It's great in theory, but micromanaging businesses like this is over reach, though typical for NYC.

Re: New York City bans employers from asking potential workers about past salary

#193

Post by j2bax »

krenden9 wrote: post #167
jimparkins wrote: post #20

Have a google for: "can i lie to a employer about past salary" - it really really messes with people - people feel super uncertain about how to approach this situation. Throwing any confidence they have during the negotiation out the window. Even now I hesitate to write this as a million people will come out and say never lie - what if they found out. More than banning. There needs to be acceptance that if someone as…

I totally lie any time a recruiter asks for my current/past salary. How much I lie depends on what I think I should be getting for the role, and how likely it is that they can and will confirm the numbers I gave. At my most recent past job, I was working for some guys at a small startup for next to nothing in salary (~$40k). I had a 10% stake in equity, but it was worth nothing, since the company was in debt. When I…

I hope I never hire someone like you by accident. I have a feeling it wouldn't take long until this outlook would lead to other problems in the workplace that would have you on to your next con.

Re: New York City bans employers from asking potential workers about past salary

#194

Post by TulliusCicero »

teej wrote: post #191
lend000 wrote: post #184

There's a case to be made for an employee protection preventing an employer from firing an employee for refusing to produce pay stubs from a past employer. However, I've said it before -- preventing a question from being asked is state overreach and constitutes a violation of the first amendment, in my opinion.

There are already loads of questions that employers aren't allowed to ask. Are you married? Are you pregnant? How many kids do you have? Is your significant other black? When was the last time you went to church? So, you're about 50, is that right?

Technically they can ask those things, they're just not allowed to discriminate based on the answers, so asking them is a bad idea.

Re: New York City bans employers from asking potential workers about past salary

#195

Post by gdulli »

kesselvon wrote: post #91
ransom1538 wrote: post #71

So people on HN are pro employers posting their employee salaries publicly but against previous companies asking what their salaries are. WTF. I must be missing something here. I personally believe your salary is your business. Period. Getting salary information bad, forcing employees to divulge salaries from a position of power is disgusting. Here is me being publicly quartered on HN for pushing back on forcing empl…

Companies asking for your previous salary means theyre going to try to pay you with your past salary being a benchmark to work with, not necessarily what the position is worth. Companies posting employee salaries publicly aims for employees at said company to be paid at the same level (with similar experience). There's a subtle difference. Every time I've been asked about salary its been an obvious ploy to lowball my…

> Employees literally have zero incentive not to lie, since employers can't verify

That assumes you feel lying is wrong only because of the circumstances of getting caught vs. valuing honesty for its own sake.

Re: New York City bans employers from asking potential workers about past salary

#196

Post by sjg007 »

lend000 wrote: post #184

There's a case to be made for an employee protection preventing an employer from firing an employee for refusing to produce pay stubs from a past employer. However, I've said it before -- preventing a question from being asked is state overreach and constitutes a violation of the first amendment, in my opinion.

I mean, they could fire you or just demote your pay otherwise. So your best bet is multiple offers.

Re: New York City bans employers from asking potential workers about past salary

#197

Post by antisthenes »

sidlls wrote: post #93
tlrobinson wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Could that be considered fraud?

No more than: * We hire only the best * We value your career progress * We are transparent about the company's strategies and financials * We value taking the time to think through the design of features and products And so on. Most of which are, to be charitable, only very loosely applicable when they aren't outright lies.

* We think of you as family!

Re: New York City bans employers from asking potential workers about past salary

#198

Post by krenden9 »

mi100hael wrote: post #190
krenden9 wrote: post #167

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I totally lie any time a recruiter asks for my current/past salary. How much I lie depends on what I think I should be getting for the role, and how likely it is that they can and will confirm the numbers I gave. At my most recent past job, I was working for some guys at a small startup for next to nothing in salary (~$40k). I had a 10% stake in equity, but it was worth nothing, since the company was in debt. When I…

There is 0 chance any past employer is going to divulge compensation details of a former employee to some random jackass recruiter that comes calling.

That depends. Larger corporations tend to avoid asking things other than "Did John Doe work here as title Z from date X to date Y?" However, many smaller companies aren't legally savvy and will divulge too much information, if the other side asks questions they probably shouldn't be.

Re: New York City bans employers from asking potential workers about past salary

#199

Post by davemel37 »

pc86 wrote: post #172
jnwatson wrote: post #124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Anchoring only works if the potential employer is ready to buy. Many, many organizations will simply use the number as yet another filter, and you won't even begin discussions. By giving a number first, you're either too high and you won't have an opportunity to sell yourself, you're too low and you've literally already negotiated against yourself, or you're lucky and right at their expectation, which you could have…

This is why we publish salary ranges with our job ads but also require a desired salary within that range from candidates.

Every time I ever tried this, the candidates hover around the top of the range regardless of qualification and experience.

Re: New York City bans employers from asking potential workers about past salary

#200

Post by showmethemoney »

Once upon a time I interviewed for a role in NYC. An employee that I spoke to said they paid pretty well, and I could expect about 120. The HR person wanted my previous salary, and I refused. Eventually they said their range was 130-150. I said it wasn't gonna work cause I was looking for something more like 220. They said okay we can do that no problem. My previous salary was 110.
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