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Massachusetts Bans Employers from Asking Applicants About Previous Pay

nytimes.com

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Re: Massachusetts Bans Employers from Asking Applicants About Previous Pay

#541

Post by WalterBright »

toomuchtodo wrote: post #520
eru wrote: post #479

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you get bitten by that, you are just a bad negotiator.

64k Bay Area tech workers were bad negotiators? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High-Tech_Employee_Antitrust_L...

"Our policy only impacted cold calling, and we continued to recruit from these companies through LinkedIn, job fairs, employee referrals, or when candidates approached Google directly. In fact, we hired hundreds of employees from the companies involved during this time period."

It doesn't sound like it was very effective. Cartels in general tend to be unstable, as members have powerful incentives to cheat on the agreement.

It's hard to say if this agreement actually reduced salaries in any significant way, as there were plenty of other companies in the area who were not part of the cartel.

Re: Massachusetts Bans Employers from Asking Applicants About Previous Pay

#542

Post by mancerayder »

johnward wrote: post #118
slg wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am a developer, so I am all for higher developer salaries, but your posts shows a common misunderstanding about economics. The value someone creates has nothing to do with their salary. Their salary is dictated by how many people need to hire developers and how many developers exist to fill those jobs or in simple terms, supply and demand. I might create millions of dollars in value with my code, but there might be…

It should be noted that several tech employers were found to be illegally colluding to artificially lower wages.

This, slightly adjusted, would make a killer Onion headline.

Re: Massachusetts Bans Employers from Asking Applicants About Previous Pay

#543

Post by bcheung »

rev_bird wrote: post #400
bcheung wrote: post #283

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm fine with the not discriminating part, it's the asking part I'm concerned with. It seems like censorship and going against Freedom of Speech to me. A better law would be that employers may not discriminate or refuse to hire someone if they refuse to tell them their previous salary. Specificity is key, just saying you can't ask feels too overreaching. The intent is to prevent discrimination, not speech.

>A better law would be that employers may not discriminate or refuse to hire someone if they refuse to tell them their previous salary. To be honest, this does not seem like a better law at all. "You can ask about this information, but you can't use it" just means they'll come up with some other excuse for doing whatever they wanted to do all along. The problem isn't the "speech" itself, it's the demanding of informa…

Asking is different than demanding. They can't use it if they didn't receive an answer.

They can ask, and then the candidate can choose whether they want to answer or not. It may be beneficial to the candidate to answer, or they may not really care if the company knows.

It accomplishes the same thing but doesn't limit speech.

Sometimes a job candidate might even want them to ask so they can set the minimum bar of what they are looking for without appearing to bring up compensation first.

I would take the same stance with any of the other "can't ask" questions (they can ask, but can't demand).

BTW, there's no law that says an employer can't ask about religion, children, etc. The law says they can't discriminate. It's just recommended practice to not ask those questions to not give any evidence for a discrimination lawsuit.

The law says, "an unlawful employment practice is established when the complaining party demonstrates that race, color, religion, sex, or national origin was a motivating factor for any employment practice"

https://www.eeoc.gov/laws/statutes/titlevii.cfm

But exceptions are allowed when it is relevant to the job. A casting director can certainly discriminate based on age, sex, etc.

Re: Massachusetts Bans Employers from Asking Applicants About Previous Pay

#544

Post by gauruvbose »

markonthewall wrote: post #11

I love the US and California, the tech scene is amazing and I was lucky to met such talented and friendly people in about every place I worked... from very large tech cos to "garage" startups. Which is why it pains me to see that so many engineers get stuck with such ridiculous salaries (relative to the value and wealth they provide and create). Problem is that some salaries are seemingly high compared to what the av…

Pay=marginal productivity. There's a field called economics.

Re: Massachusetts Bans Employers from Asking Applicants About Previous Pay

#545

Post by jazzyk »

IncRnd wrote: post #537
jazzyk wrote: post #156

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But they are exposed! In case of financial trouble (very common at startups), who gets to be laid off first, the CEO or the developer? Also, rank-and-file employees are typically scape-goated in legal proceedings, example: finance people going to jail for rogue/insider trading, even though upper management at least encouraged such behavior.

>> But they are exposed! For their exposure, employees are compensated with salaries. Are you willing to pay your company money if the product you work on misses expectations?

Does the CEO pay? The founders don't get to pay the compamy, they usually don't invest cash (in angel/VC-funded startups). With some luck/skill the company gets sold/aqui-hired and the investors can get their money back. Not always, but quite often.

Re: Massachusetts Bans Employers from Asking Applicants About Previous Pay

#546

Post by thesimpsons1022 »

jazzyk wrote: post #188
morgante wrote: post #149

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A 7 figure annual income is setting the affluent definition very high. You can work at Google for a decade and end up a multi-millionaire, with enough money to retire to most places in the US. From your other comment, it seems like you haven't done the analysis on this. Top companies are routinely paying $200k-300k these days. That's enough to save a million dollars over a decade even if you have a family.

>Top companies are routinely paying $200k-300k these days Yup, all four of them - Apple, Facebook, Google, Netflix.

Not sure why Apple or Netflix show up on your list. There is about 50 companies I can think of above them.

Re: Massachusetts Bans Employers from Asking Applicants About Previous Pay

#547

Post by winter_blue »

mercutio2 wrote: post #508
dvt wrote: post #284

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ok, so maybe I'm just bad at math. I know that if you make 200k as an engineer in NYC (which is STILL high[1]), you make around 10k a month after taxes. 10k - 2k for rent - 1k for expenses = 7k saved if you don't go on vacation, and literally do nothing that costs money for ten years. Even saving 7k a month, you won't save 100k a year. [1] https://www.glassdoor.com/Salaries/new-york-city-software-en...

You are exaggerating NYC income taxes. At $200k, your effective income tax rate if you file single, including FICA, is 33%, not 40% [0]. Heck, your marginal tax rate isn't even 40%, and all those numbers are without taking a 401k tax deduction. People get this crazy idea that $200k isn't rich in NYC or SF. It is very, very rich, even for the area. COL adjustment for rent and groceries shaves off $15-30k, but it doesn…

> Heck, your marginal tax rate isn't even 40%

That's wrong. The marginal tax for even a $50,000/year earner in NYC is over 42%.

Source: http://arjun-menon.github.io/taxes-in-nyc/?income=50,000

Re: Massachusetts Bans Employers from Asking Applicants About Previous Pay

#548

Post by [deleted] »

mercutio2 wrote: post #508
dvt wrote: post #284

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ok, so maybe I'm just bad at math. I know that if you make 200k as an engineer in NYC (which is STILL high[1]), you make around 10k a month after taxes. 10k - 2k for rent - 1k for expenses = 7k saved if you don't go on vacation, and literally do nothing that costs money for ten years. Even saving 7k a month, you won't save 100k a year. [1] https://www.glassdoor.com/Salaries/new-york-city-software-en...

You are exaggerating NYC income taxes. At $200k, your effective income tax rate if you file single, including FICA, is 33%, not 40% [0]. Heck, your marginal tax rate isn't even 40%, and all those numbers are without taking a 401k tax deduction. People get this crazy idea that $200k isn't rich in NYC or SF. It is very, very rich, even for the area. COL adjustment for rent and groceries shaves off $15-30k, but it doesn…

[deleted]

Re: Massachusetts Bans Employers from Asking Applicants About Previous Pay

#549

Post by adrusi »

eru wrote: post #477
adrusi wrote: post #366

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If there exist jobs that produce $1MM in value but that have a going rate of 200k, then there should be more of those jobs This is true generally, but I think it doesn't apply in context. Tech has saturated the existing market, there is no demand to be satisfied for more tech. Of course, the industry will continue to grow, but only because the very nature of tech is to innovate. Growth in tech doesn't come from creat…

As long as not everyone has eg an iPhone, I see plenty of demand for tech left.

No. People who don't have an iPhone either have a different smartphone (their demand is owned by Apple's competition), they can't afford a smartphone (they're not a source of demand — until someone innovates and makes a cheaper smartphone), or they've actively chosen not to own a smartphone (not a source of demand).

Re: Massachusetts Bans Employers from Asking Applicants About Previous Pay

#550

Post by maxxxxx »

One of my coworkers just got hired by one of the big Silicon Valley companies and he said that the company knew his salary down to the cent without him disclosing it. Does anybody know how they could have found out? Could this be part of the background check?
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