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An update on salary transparency in job posts

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Re: An update on salary transparency in job posts

#31
post #7

I hope the next step is narrowing the ranges of "info" provided. You'll sometimes see postings like "Sr Staff Engineer at [fancy corp]: 135K-900K". Info like that is better than nothing, sure, but not by much.

Have you seen those absurdly wide ranges outside Netflix? They pay all cash and computed their ranges in a pretty silly way that produces nonsensical lower bounds.

Re: An update on salary transparency in job posts

#32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>How is someone supposed to reasonably negotiate that role? Get a competing job offer. A minimum price lets labor sellers know if it is worth applying or not, and trends in supply and demand for that type of labor (based on which way the minimums are moving industry wide).

or “unethically” (depending on your ethics!), you could just _say_ you have a competing offer. Unless there is like some secret hiring manager slack where people ask each other “did you really send that person an offer?”.

You did used to be able to similarly overstate your current salary, and then something quite a lot more formal than "secret slack channel" evolved. And it's often not accurate. Urgh.

Re: An update on salary transparency in job posts

#33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>How is someone supposed to reasonably negotiate that role? Get a competing job offer. A minimum price lets labor sellers know if it is worth applying or not, and trends in supply and demand for that type of labor (based on which way the minimums are moving industry wide).

The timing on this is rather difficult though, and its non trivial time and effort

In any market, sellers should always be constantly seeking buyers and negotiating prices if they are interested in receiving the highest prices.

Re: An update on salary transparency in job posts

#34
post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>How is someone supposed to reasonably negotiate that role? Get a competing job offer. A minimum price lets labor sellers know if it is worth applying or not, and trends in supply and demand for that type of labor (based on which way the minimums are moving industry wide).

There is a 0% chance that I'd put in the effort to get an offer from a company just to set my price with a company I'd like to work for. No company is worth that headache. If I happen to already have a competing offer, sure. But when job searching I'm not carpet bombing resumes, I'm targeting specific companies that I think would be a match.

Then that is the price of not having the headache. Markets work best when buyers AND sellers are constantly engaging in negotiations.

Re: An update on salary transparency in job posts

#35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>How is someone supposed to reasonably negotiate that role? Get a competing job offer. A minimum price lets labor sellers know if it is worth applying or not, and trends in supply and demand for that type of labor (based on which way the minimums are moving industry wide).

or “unethically” (depending on your ethics!), you could just _say_ you have a competing offer. Unless there is like some secret hiring manager slack where people ask each other “did you really send that person an offer?”.

The counteroffer can easily be conditioned on seeing a copy of your offer. They don't need to see it today, but they might when you start your job...

Re: An update on salary transparency in job posts

#36

Big tech salary postings are mostly useless, because bonus and stock aren't included and could be more than half of total comp.

As someone in tech looking for a role, I agree, though there is some utility for big tech companies where compensation data is available elsewhere. By looking at the upper bound of the salary, I can reasonably infer the level of the role. For example, level 6 SWE roles at Meta show an upper bound of $241k and level 7 SWE roles show $289 (or thereabouts, IIRC).

It's still of limited utility though, since one has to still use an external source to identify bonus percentage and possible range of equity values.

Re: An update on salary transparency in job posts

#37
I'd take this number with some salt.

Most job boards I've seem correctly parse salary ranges buried in job descriptions about 75% of the time.

Also, this is just one job board; in all my time using internet career websites, I have never even heard of directly apply, so the headline seems a bit sensational in terms of what's being claimed.

Re: An update on salary transparency in job posts

#38
post #2

Now lets quantify how many of them are absurd listings. Recently saw a Senior Security Engineer role for Netflix, $100-$700k salary range. How is someone supposed to reasonably negotiate that role? $100k is clearly a joke, $700k is clearly a salary someone got during the bubble. Do I come in at $400k? Is $250k a bargain rate? https://imgur.com/a/0Fe00Qf

A big range like that means you should feel more than fine selecting the average— so $400k— at the minimum. Anything less and you’re essentially admitting you don’t think you’re worth what the salary range is. Personally I would ask for clarification, and if they refuse to provide any, ask for near or above the top-end of the range. Theres plenty of $215k salary jobs currently, so if you happen to not land this one,…

> A big range like that means you should feel more than fine selecting the average— so $400k— at the minimum. Anything less and you’re essentially admitting you don’t think you’re worth what the salary range is.

But does this mean that no one who is "worth what the salary range is" should be paid in the bottom half of the range?

Re: An update on salary transparency in job posts

#39
post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is an often proffered limitation of these laws, but there are second order effects. If someone hires a woman, minority, whatever else, at the $100k rate with the same qualifications they typically hire X group at the $700k rate, they're going to have some 'splainin' to do.

Perfect is the enemy of good enough. If laws are found to have bugs, you keep patching them over time to close the loopholes.

Unfortunately, the patch cycle for laws is, by design, incredibly slow.

Re: An update on salary transparency in job posts

#40
This will lead to universal low salaries, and real comp decided by bonuses and equity grants like with IB and Amazon. You don’t see full comp revealed, so since they have to show their hand it will trend down and make up the money for who they want to pay more with bonus etc
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