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New law bans California employers from asking applicants their prior salary

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Re: New law bans California employers from asking applicants their prior salary

#251

Post by woolvalley »

duskwuff wrote: post #100
alexanderstears wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's how price discovery can work in markets. "How much is that tomato?" "$5" "Yikes. Too much for me. Thanks for your time"

And that's exactly how salary negotiations work now -- the applicant can name an expected salary, and the employer can respond accordingly. The only thing that's changed is that what you've been paid in the past doesn't have to be a part of that discussion.

It's a bit more like:

"What did you pay your previous supplier for those tomatoes?"

"$4"

"I will charge you $3.95 and nothing less."

Re: New law bans California employers from asking applicants their prior salary

#252

Post by ryandrake »

CodeWriter23 wrote: post #209
disiplus wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

how about telling the candidates in front that the expected salary is in the range of x-y.

Any prospective employee who asks me is going to get an answer that is 20% lower than the other job description they were eligible for prior to asking.

Would you be OK with the prospective employee quoting you a salary 20% above what he's currently making if you asked?

Re: New law bans California employers from asking applicants their prior salary

#253

Post by bargl »

hyperionos wrote: post #103
bargl wrote: post #54

I've recently been on both ends of the table here. I don't share my previous salary but I'm always willing to share a pay range. The range being higher than I'd ever expect to get paid. I find this to be important when discussing salary with an employer because it gives me a baseline to continue discussions. If they can't meet my bottom line then I'm not interested. The reason I give a range is because salary is only…

"I don't share my previous salary but I'm always willing to share a pay range. The range being higher than I'd ever expect to get paid." That sounds like you are actively exaggerating the amount you have been paid previously to establish a "baseline" of what you are willing to accept as a minimum salary in the job you're applying for. Anyways, from what I understand, the new law does not seem to prohibit you from ask…

> Anyways, from what I understand, the new law does not seem to prohibit you from asking for a salary (range) that the applicant would be willing to accept, just from asking for how much specifically they made in the past.

This is a very good point. It's a fine line but I appreciate the input.

I do give a rather large range. It's typically a 20-40% range based on how much I want the job. And I tailor it to every employer.

Re: New law bans California employers from asking applicants their prior salary

#254

Post by vilmosi »

vilmosi wrote: post #224
everdev wrote: post #212

Earlier quoted context omitted.

All Americans have a right to privacy. Their reason for privacy doesn't matter and doesn't need to make sense to you. Compensation is an important conversation to make sure a job is a win/win. I think "What would you like to be paid?" is the most relevant question anyway.

[deleted]

[deleted]

Re: New law bans California employers from asking applicants their prior salary

#255

Post by bentruyman »

duskwuff wrote: post #37
bentruyman wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Probably because it's always been legal for you to refuse to give that information.

And it was equally legal for companies to drop you from consideration for a job if you refused. :/

Is this actually happening? After a good interview, qualified employees are being turned away by companies in the later stages of the interview/employment process, simply due to candidates refusing to divulge their current salary? I mean, I'm sure it _has_ happened, not sure if that's a strong argument though.

Re: New law bans California employers from asking applicants their prior salary

#256

Post by ryandrake »

pmoriarty wrote: post #30
nicolashahn wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Kind of off topic but should one always hide their current salary, even if it's above market rate (given their experience on paper)? It seems as though if an employer were only looking to spend so much on a hire, then if you're already likely above that number, wouldn't it save both you and the employer's time? I can see the obvious downside of sharing a relatively low salary, but it seems like there could be benefit…

I never consider interviewing to be a waste of time. At the very least I get some very valuable practice out of it, learn more about what's out there, and meet some interesting people. Even if they wind up not hiring you because they find out you're too expensive for their current budget, their budget might increase in the future and they might try to hire you again. Or the people who you made a favorable-enough impr…

> I never consider interviewing to be a waste of time.

Most on-site interviews require you to take a day off. If you've got 10 days of PTO, you can do a maximum of 10 interviews a year, and that's if you don't get sick or take any vacation. There is definitely a cost to interviewing.

Re: New law bans California employers from asking applicants their prior salary

#257

Post by cname »

buryat wrote: post #68
vultour wrote: post #14

Not an American, couldn't you just tell them a made up number?

Better yet telling them what salary you want and not disclose your previous salary. Don't start you work relationship with a lie.

That sounds nice, but it seems like most if not all work relationships are based on at least dishonesty through omission if not outright lies.

Employers rarely give a full and true picture of what it's like to work somewhere. It's mostly "everything's great" and "all the people are great" and so on. You might get a bland "we need to work on X" if you press them, but they're very unlikely to be direct about the day-to-day drudgery, dysfunction, etc.

Due to the asymmetrical power relationship of employers/employees, I can't see a real ethical problem with lying in response to a question they shouldn't be asking in the first place.

Re: New law bans California employers from asking applicants their prior salary

#258

Post by CobrastanJorji »

alexanderstears wrote: post #18
civilian wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Equifax has salary data? I hadn't heard that. //edit: Well shit, TIL: https://krebsonsecurity.com/2017/10/equifax-breach-fallout-y...

They do - I'm not sure how they licence it though or what data sources they use but I've seen that their data on high income households is the best in the business and shockingly accurate. However, I can't imagine the compliance nightmare that would exist around a process that lets HR people look up people's equifax information. If they get a full report, it could contain information about disabilities, national orig…

This makes me wonder. My employer has some customer data. We're very careful about not just letting any random employee access it without careful permission, auditing, logging, etc. Customer privacy is important to us.

At Equifax, though, information about random people isn't customer data. It's the product. They give it to anyone who asks for money. Do they have any motivation to say J random employee can't just look up everybody's data? Why? Letting you have free access to what they charge everyone else for would just be a perk, right?

Re: New law bans California employers from asking applicants their prior salary

#259

Post by maxxxxx »

jogjayr wrote: post #186
geebee wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, but not with names, and not for every employee (ie., including non H1B workers), right?

For H1B workers years of education and education is also provided. In most cases it's enough information for de-anonymization. On the whole you may be right about making salaries public. Norway's made tax return public [1] across the board and the sky hasn't fallen in. Though to be fair in the Norwegian model you find out who has been looking at your salary info. The counter-argument is that a system like that could…

Salaries in US Congress are also public and it's not a big deal. A lot of people don't like the idea of public salaries but I am pretty sure it would be to the benefit of the employee.

Salary negotiation as an accountant should be pretty since you know exactly how much people make.

Re: New law bans California employers from asking applicants their prior salary

#260

Post by gcb0 »

icelancer wrote: post #164
Sangermaine wrote: post #154

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>No thank you. >My salary is private. I do not want my family and friends to know how much I make. But have you thought about why you feel this way? I assume you are American, as am I, and so I understand we've been socialized by our culture to feel this way, but it really makes no sense. It's just a way to harm workers by keeping us from seeing when we're being screwed. I'd even go so far as to wager that this entir…

>>But have you thought about why you feel this way? Yes. I don't want to increase my attractiveness regarding a house robbery, as I live well below my means in a developing neighborhood, amongst other reasons. I very much understand the concept of leverage and have no problems privately discussing my salary amongst groups that I trust. That doesn't include the entire Internet.

so you would outright reject any job in the government, even in a subsidised University?
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