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Ask HN: Why are some YC startups not posting salary ranges when law requires it?

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Re: Ask HN: Why are some YC startups not posting salary ranges when law requires it?

#241

Post by throwaway98797 »

SpeedilyDamage wrote: post #95
throwaway98797 wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

posting a number can help confident people but hurts others example, developer makes 100k, has imposter syndrome, sees a great job that has an internal range of 150k-200k. if the dev knew the range they’d think no way they would qualify for THAT much money. the company would happily pay at bottom range for them, but instead they don’t even see the developer. ranges select for confident people.

I'm sorry but... what kind of victim blaming nonsense is this? Seeing a salary range intimidates people?! That's 100% worth the cost, friend. Knowing what you're applying for/to is absolutely critical information, and having it before applying is a substantial amount of leverage in any negotiation. That's like saying people shouldn't post where a job is because some people might not live there, or not to post C++ job…

i’ve had nearly 10+ jobs and i never knew the range

also on higher levels comp comes from equity base pay of $100k is immaterial if RSU/equity is $500k

i do believe it hurts the people in weaker positions vs helping

cause high comp individuals know how to play the game anyways

Re: Ask HN: Why are some YC startups not posting salary ranges when law requires it?

#242

Post by jamiequint »

indymike wrote: post #91
paulgb wrote: post #53

There are some comments in here that verge on assuming bad faith on the part of the companies involved, so I think it's worth pointing out that this is a new law which has been in effect for just over a month. It's been on the way for a while, so it's not “sudden”, but it’s still a new thing that people are figuring out and it’s easier to forget about if you’re in the habit of re-using old listings. (Not about OP, wh…

>There are some comments in here that verge on assuming bad faith on the part of the companies involved Not disclosing pay is illegal in three states in the US, and has the practical effect of reducing the number of applicants to the advertised job by 14%, so it's self-harming for the employer anyway. Bonus: a lot of job boards will just plug an "estimated salary" in for you to max their CTR and revenue on syndicatio…

> It has the effect of reducing the number of applicants by 14% (if you believe the study) only if at market rate or higher.

Most startups are paying the lower end of market rate to below market rate salaries and compensating more with equity, so it's not necessarily irrational on the part of the startups.

> But for startups and venture funded, high growth companies to be unaware after two years is not cool

There are a million more important things to worry about at most startups than being in regulatory compliance with every silly law. I would venture to guess that the more a startup is in regulatory compliance with every little thing the less likely it is to succeed.

Re: Ask HN: Why are some YC startups not posting salary ranges when law requires it?

#243

Post by neon_electro »

wintogreen74 wrote: post #189
indymike wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I routinely hire developers in 24 hours from initial contact. It's fun watching them get random recruiter calls two or three weeks later. "I'm not interested, I STARTED my new job three weeks ago. No, I'm not willing to leave for that. Have a nice day." Except the "Have a nice day" part is usually less friendly and polite.

How can either side get an accurate assessment of the other in such a short time? I was hired by my current employer in less than 2 weeks from initial conversation and it was a bit of a smell that they weren't more thorough. Now I'm a hiring manager and am a little concerned with what I feel are "loose" practices that let too many marginal candidates through because otherwise "it's too hard to source talent". For me…

To add anecdata to your post here, in the height of the hiring craze last year, I accepted an "above-market" (from my perspective) offer from a company called Provi. They took less than a week from initial recruiter call to offer.

Fast forward to this past February, and I'm being let go for "performance reasons", but it's a lot clearer in retrospect that I should've been failed out of their interview process if it was any good, and that seeking to hire someone within a week is now sort of a yellow flag for me.

I want to move fast, but I also want my counter-party to do proper due diligence.

Re: Ask HN: Why are some YC startups not posting salary ranges when law requires it?

#244

Post by lalopalota »

indymike wrote: post #138
kuboble wrote: post #127

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are the companies indeed inflicting self harm? They might get less applications that way, but posting salary ranges for new employees has other downsides - e.g. it might tilt existing employees. Another downside is that it's easy to scrap and collect this data and companies might not like candidates or employees easily accessing historical data. Sharing salary range basically reduces the knowledge advantage of a comp…

> Are the companies indeed inflicting self harm? They are spending 14% more on recruitment advertising than they would have to if they just put a range in the salary box. So, yes, financial self harm. 14% is substantial for many companies. > ther downsides - e.g. it might tilt existing employees. People have access to wage data and job boards in their pocket. If they answer that unknown caller, it's as likely to be a…

> reducing the number of applicants to the advertised job by 14%

does not mean

> spending 14% more on recruitment advertising

if a company gets 86 applicants instead of 100, that's less screening work which means less $ spent for the hire.

Re: Ask HN: Why are some YC startups not posting salary ranges when law requires it?

#246

Post by cm2012 »

wintogreen74 wrote: post #189
indymike wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I routinely hire developers in 24 hours from initial contact. It's fun watching them get random recruiter calls two or three weeks later. "I'm not interested, I STARTED my new job three weeks ago. No, I'm not willing to leave for that. Have a nice day." Except the "Have a nice day" part is usually less friendly and polite.

How can either side get an accurate assessment of the other in such a short time? I was hired by my current employer in less than 2 weeks from initial conversation and it was a bit of a smell that they weren't more thorough. Now I'm a hiring manager and am a little concerned with what I feel are "loose" practices that let too many marginal candidates through because otherwise "it's too hard to source talent". For me…

How often do you actually learn something material after the first hour of interviewing? In my experience almost never.

Re: Ask HN: Why are some YC startups not posting salary ranges when law requires it?

#247

Post by tester756 »

wintogreen74 wrote: post #189
indymike wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I routinely hire developers in 24 hours from initial contact. It's fun watching them get random recruiter calls two or three weeks later. "I'm not interested, I STARTED my new job three weeks ago. No, I'm not willing to leave for that. Have a nice day." Except the "Have a nice day" part is usually less friendly and polite.

How can either side get an accurate assessment of the other in such a short time? I was hired by my current employer in less than 2 weeks from initial conversation and it was a bit of a smell that they weren't more thorough. Now I'm a hiring manager and am a little concerned with what I feel are "loose" practices that let too many marginal candidates through because otherwise "it's too hard to source talent". For me…

>How can either side get an accurate assessment of the other in such a short time?

Hmm? you just perform 1-2h interview and decide?

>These are the N phases, we aim to be completed in X days/weeks and you will always know what's next and when it will occur."

Why would you need N technical interviews to decide whether somebody is worth their money?

Re: Ask HN: Why are some YC startups not posting salary ranges when law requires it?

#248

Post by meltyness »

wendyshu wrote: post #219
SamWhited wrote: post #16

A friend of mine asked about one of these recently and they wouldn't give him a salary range, so he reported them to the attorney general and they immediately put one on their website. Can't hurt to ask (although in that case they may only give it to you, if they do, move on to step 2 anyways), then if they don't update it report them and you'll be doing everyone else a favor too.

Is there a link for reporting to the attorney general?

Yes[0]!

[0]https://www1.nyc.gov/assets/cchr/downloads/pdf/publications/...

Re: Ask HN: Why are some YC startups not posting salary ranges when law requires it?

#249

Post by tomhallett »

mywittyname wrote: post #234
grepLeigh wrote: post #204

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My unsolicited advice (for founders) is to hire the best people you can afford. I've seen startups blow 2-3 headcount worth of budget to secure a FAANG engineer, only to realize that engineer needed an SRE to deploy their code, a tools engineer to setup their CI/CD, etc. The founders were so excited to add "FAANG engineer" to their Series A deck. Firing this engineer was tough because the startup went to the board to…

A CEO eventually has to develop the courage to deliver bad news to the board.

100% agreed, but for the CEO's who are making the above mistake, if they have other bad news to deliver to the board (low revenues, etc), then they might be afraid to deliver yet another piece of bad news on the hiring side.

Re: Ask HN: Why are some YC startups not posting salary ranges when law requires it?

#250

Post by dang »

eduction wrote: post #199

YC’s HN altered the submission in a way that erases the previously stated fact that this behavior is a violation of NYC law, which leaves the discussion unresponsive to the question and also risks the appearance of trying to hide the illegal behavior. There were probably other reasons behind the change but to preserve the meaning of the post something about this being a possible/likely violation of nyc law should IMO…

I explained the title change here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33974170. I think you make a good point though, so I've edited it again.

For those curious, the originally submitted title was "Ask HN: Why are YC companies breaking hiring laws?" and the first edit was "Ask HN: Why are YC companies hiring in NYC not posting their salary range? I've just edited it a second time, to "Ask HN: Why are YC companies in NYC posting their salary range, as law requires?". I don't think that's a very good HN title, as it makes a general claim about "YC companies in NYC" which is almost certainly both untrue and unfair. But for reasons I explained at https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33974170, I suppose it's ok as a tradeoff.

Edit: whoops that second edit dropped the 'not', which was obviously critical. I've replaced it with Ask HN: Why are YC companies in NYC not posting salary range, as law requires?.

Edit 2: I've changed it again in response to https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33976153. It's now "Ask HN: Why are some YC startups not posting salary ranges when law requires it?"

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