Employers use your personal data to figure out the lowest salary you'll accept • Hacker News Board

Re: Employers use your personal data to figure out the lowest salary you'll accept

#211

Post by runako » Mon, Apr 06, 2026, 2:42 PM UTC

lesuorac wrote: post #168

exitb wrote: post #151

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s a very common arrangement, both with and without kids, once you look past the gender of particular participants.

It's very common for a teacher's salary to pay the expenses of two adults and 2+ kids? I guess it must be nice not living in high col areas.

There can be a lot of factors at play:

- how old are they? If the poster is ~60, likely has savings and may even have Social Security income. If they worked as (say) a police officer for 20 years, they may have pension income. A 47-year-old former military officer could reasonably have kids at home and also pension income from the military.

- Many people inherit houses (most houses are eventually inherited). Most sell them, but it can be a viable choice to just move into an inherited house to zero out housing expense. OR one could inherit a house that is >> valuable than one's own, such that selling the inherited house allows one to pay off one's own house.

- Location. The Discourse typically divides between HCOL and LCOL, but ignores that in both there are also people who spend much less than the average. In NYC the average home price is ~$850k, but there are today listings for 3BR homes in the low $200s (And of course these are stackable. One could have a military pension and buy a cheaper place and have a buffer from an inheritance. (None of this is uncommon.)

Re: Employers use your personal data to figure out the lowest salary you'll accept

#212

Post by CuriouslyC » Mon, Apr 06, 2026, 2:43 PM UTC

impish9208 wrote: post #156

There was a story recently about how large landlords use salary data to raise rents. If they see you got a raise, they’ll increase your rent accordingly. And pretty soon, retailers will do the same. Your personalized price for a gallon of milk at Walmart will reflect your annual raise. I love living in the future!

I foresee people shopping in masks, with phone off, using cash as a protest, and poor people being black market designated shoppers.

Re: Employers use your personal data to figure out the lowest salary you'll accept

#213

Post by Aurornis » Mon, Apr 06, 2026, 2:43 PM UTC

canpan wrote: post #8

I wonder if the winning game becomes your own boss and tiny companies. I want to do the jump, but lack of courage, good ideas, sales skills and a very good salary still holding me back (open for suggestions). But if the very good salary would go away, the scales tip instantly.

> I wonder if the winning game becomes your own boss and tiny companies.

Building a successful set of tiny companies is very hard. Unless you get lucky with the exact right idea, execution, and market timing it’s really hard to build a single business that pays as well as our tech jobs do. Building multiple companies is even harder.

I think everyone sees the survivorship bias examples like the levels.io guy or a few of the app developers who got rich and thinks it must be easy because their businesses were simple. The indie hacker communities are filled with people trying to follow in their footsteps and not getting anywhere despite years of hard work. The levels.io success story is not something that is easily replicated because his signups depend so heavily on his huge Twitter presence, where he pushes his sites under the guise of friendly information sharing. People without Twitter audiences try all the time to replicate his success and then wonder why they’re not getting signups like he does.

Re: Employers use your personal data to figure out the lowest salary you'll accept

#214

Post by elzbardico » Mon, Apr 06, 2026, 2:43 PM UTC

saghm wrote: post #80

putlake wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thank you for the link. I tried to opt out. They sent me this email: Equifax Workforce Solutions (provider of The Work Number) has received your employee request communication, but additional information described below is required to fulfill this request. We will be following up with a secure email to obtain the below requested documents: Proof of Identity: Provide a copy of one of the following (must include curren…

Obviously they have to be careful. What if they didn't check all this and someone went and tried to opt out on your behalf? That would be an incredible invasion of your privacy!

"They care a lot!"

Re: Employers use your personal data to figure out the lowest salary you'll accept

#215

Post by chasd00 » Mon, Apr 06, 2026, 2:44 PM UTC

lesuorac wrote: post #168

exitb wrote: post #151

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s a very common arrangement, both with and without kids, once you look past the gender of particular participants.

It's very common for a teacher's salary to pay the expenses of two adults and 2+ kids? I guess it must be nice not living in high col areas.

they said "teacher" but also mention writing grants. A high school teacher isn't writing grants, their wife could be bringing in a lot more than the typical teacher.

Re: Employers use your personal data to figure out the lowest salary you'll accept

#216

Post by elzbardico » Mon, Apr 06, 2026, 2:46 PM UTC

Archonical wrote: post #202

ozgrakkurt wrote: post #198

This is a very complex problem as far as I can understand. You will be in trouble if that person left their last job because they were unhappy about pay or if the value you are giving is lower than some other company is willing to pay. They will leave pretty soon in both cases. Or even worse, they might be in a hurry to find a job for some reason, then they will accept but see the job as temporary. Would be interesti…

Seeing what your neighbors are paying for rent is an amazing idea. I know there's quite a disparity in buildings. I imagine landlords will be squeezed from both sides this way - they wouldn't want the website to show how well a given tenant negotiated, so they may negotiate harder.

The ones who will be squeezed won't be the landlords, but the renters.

It is like salary transparency, that misteriously enough never led to low paying folks being better compensated, but by flattening out compensation for everyone who is not upper management by the lowest common.

Re: Employers use your personal data to figure out the lowest salary you'll accept

#217

Post by chasd00 » Mon, Apr 06, 2026, 2:47 PM UTC

ilikecakeandpie wrote: post #193

shrubby wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wonder what you'd do with your passion in a just world where everything of creativity (okay almost) would not need to be turned into a income. I feel this fucking form of slavery as well hard. How sorry can life be?

> I feel this fucking form of slavery as well hard I think you'd do well to learn more about how slaves were treated before making these comparisons. Have you been whipped until your flesh opened and had salt, lime juice, and peppers rubbed in the wounds because you messed up at work, where you are also forced to lived? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Thistlewood#Treatment_o...

no, but i once had my catered lunch taken away during a recession /s

Re: Employers use your personal data to figure out the lowest salary you'll accept

#218

Post by gcr » Mon, Apr 06, 2026, 2:52 PM UTC

jakevoytko wrote: post #190

alexpotato wrote: post #164

Many years ago, back when companies could ask for your previous compensation [0], a hiring manager once said to me "don't ever lie about your past compensation". I wasn't sure how they could figure this out at the time until someone later pointed out that many corporations do a credit history check on you as part of the background check. This gives them access to past compensation. The information asymmetry here is,…

An old neighbor of mine was a headhunter. He once told me that some companies had a trick to get around the law. Upon getting hired, you'd sign a document saying that you'd agree to all policies in the employee handbook. Pretty standard stuff. One of the company policies was that you needed to prove any previous salary you stated in the negotiation. If it was too far off, they'd just terminate you. The trick is that…

Isn’t that too late to negotiate compensation? I had figured most of the value is knowing how to properly lowball candidates

Re: Employers use your personal data to figure out the lowest salary you'll accept

#219

Post by elzbardico » Mon, Apr 06, 2026, 2:54 PM UTC

lesuorac wrote: post #168

exitb wrote: post #151

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s a very common arrangement, both with and without kids, once you look past the gender of particular participants.

It's very common for a teacher's salary to pay the expenses of two adults and 2+ kids? I guess it must be nice not living in high col areas.

A tenured position in a reasonably good university can give you quite a good standard of living, and depending on your area, there are even opportunities for occasional consulting work.

Not to mention that the professional prestige itself in an academic profession gives your family a lot of status that other people usually try to attain by buying expensive stuff.

Even in the fanciest neighborhoods, nobody cares if a Princeton Professor drives a 20 years old Volvo.

Re: Employers use your personal data to figure out the lowest salary you'll accept

#220

Post by doix » Mon, Apr 06, 2026, 2:55 PM UTC

ralph84 wrote: post #61

Ferret7446 wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That was always the "winning game". Only problem is that's a lot of work. The more things change, the more they stay the same; if you want more money, work harder. People who don't want to work harder complain that other people make more money because they either don't understand or are in denial about the amount of work the people they envy put in. Yes there are exceptions. No pointing out exceptions won't help you,…

Work harder on the right things. Digging holes in your backyard with a shovel is hard work but nobody is going to pay you for it.

I bet if you could make it interesting, YouTube/TikTok/Instagram/Whatever could make it possible to get paid to dig holes in your backyard.

You could argue that the value is in the entertaining filming/acting/story telling etc, but if the videos are about digging holes then I think it's valid to say someone is paying you to dig holes.