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NYC Poised to Ban Firms From Asking Job Candidates About Pay (bloomberg.com)
In a vote this week, the New York City approved legislation that will ban employers from asking job applicants about what they make in their current or past job and could have far-reaching consequences beyond the city as employers try to standardize their practices. From a report: "This bill will go a long way in addressing wage disparities women -- and particularly women of color -- face," said Public Advocate Letitia James, who sponsored the measure. White women in New York earn on average 84 percent of what white men earn, while Asian women earn 63 percent, black women earn 55 percent and Hispanic women just 46 percent, according to a report from the advocate's office, based on U.S. Census data. Asking about pay in a job interview hurts women who may start from a lower level than male candidates -- an effect that compounds over time. "It perpetuates discrimination," James said. "And it has an effect on their pensions as well."
While I do agree that questioning pay should be banned, I really wish they would stop with the "Women get paid less than men" myth. Continuing to use it is fake news.
Why wouldn't you just lie and bump it up a few grand? They aren't going to find out unless you show them your W2, and if an employer is asking for that then why would you work at such a company?
Just because you don't know what someone made in their previous job doesn't mean that they'll be offered more.
There is no need for government to insert itself into a market driven process during a salary negotion between a potential employer and employee. The employee is free to lie about past salaries (no employer will ever release this information). This is yet another example of government overreach and I'm pretty sure the Trump team will crush this under their heel once they hear about it.
I'm working at a business with low pay--where the average for a programmer is $96k here, programmers make $74k. The same is true of most IT staff, running a good 20%-30% short of the industry median.
We're also fairly diversified and have chicks and people from all over the world in our staff, and have had folks who speak Russian or obscure Indian dialects as a primary language in prominent technical positions. They're also poorly-paid, although near as I can tell we all have about the same salary.
It seems like a form of posturing: we don't want to pay salaries, so we create a perception of ... something. We're a good place to work because of something something benefits diversity open-door-policy.
Are these studies by industry, region, experience, and business? Do we say that black women earn 55% as much as white men, or do we say that black women at business X in job Y earn 55% as much as white men in business X at job Y? What happens if business X mostly hires white men for job Y, and business X' hires a higher proportion of black and asian women for job Y but also pays like shit even if you're a white man?
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What about the First Amendment?
I've never understood why someone's current salary is important to an employer. A job pays what the job is worth and the skill set the candidate brings to the table. It should not pay based on what someone is currently making as there is no relationship.
If so, then the bias will be reintroduced, unless the applicants do their homework ahead of time an ask for the higher salary.
So what? Pay negotiations still want to happen. "I can't ask you what you make now. Ok, next question: Is our offer of $100k acceptable? No? What would you consider an acceptable offer?"
Just because I can hook a shark from a boat, I do no offer to wrestle it in the water.
"Asking about pay in a job interview hurts women who may start from a lower level than male candidates -- an effect that compounds over time."
Really?
You're telling me WOMEN have never heard of 'lying'?
-Styopa
"...Asian women earn 63 percent, black women earn 55 percent and Hispanic women just 46 percent."
Reading this, it seems that racial discrimination is a larger problem than gender discrimination.
Unfortunately, it's no easier to hide skin color than it is gender. Regardless, all forms of discrimination should end.
Can I ask candidate square root of his/her current pay?
Sorry - I've only ever worked for private companies in the tech industry for the past twenty years. What is this "pension" you speak of?
Have gnu, will travel.
Big deal.
Get back to me with numbers based on Group X makes Y% of Group Z for the same job description and experience level and then we can start to worry about corrective measures.
"It perpetuates discrimination," James said. "And it has an effect on their pensions as well."
Now I know they're blowing smoke up my ass. Pensions? What pensions? I've heard of this mythical beast. I've never seen it. Boomers got pensions. I'm Gen-X. The pensions were gone, gone gone by the time I entered the workforce.
I was asked that same question many times. I had two choices:
1. Be honest and expect their salary offer wouldn't be much more than 15-20% more than my current salary
2. Lie and hope I get away with it / hope I'm a good liar
Honestly, that question is just as problematic for me as it is for a woman.
Oh look, a mom's basement joke. How very novel.
I'm sorry, but there's an entire political ideology that believes that if it makes gas cheap, CO2's properties magically change, so I'm not interested in those who weight their subjective ideologies higher than objective reality.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
Pensions?
And more false or skewed statistics to back it up. Lovely. Sorry, we're too analytical for this sort of junk.
Duh.
E.g. If I'm willing to pay $80k for the position, but I know you make $60k and I offer $70k you will probably take it as it's an increase for you and I pocket the $10k difference because you have 0 way of knowing how much I'm willing to pay to start with.
That's why ALL interviewers ask this question EVERYWHERE and will not proceed with interviews without this information unless prohibited by law.
Pass a law that requires all employers to cut all white men's pay by 50%, white women's by 40%, asian women's by 30%, etc, so all groups on average make exactly the same money. Problem solved, full equality for all! Only racist misogynists could possibly disapprove.
Part of the problem is that you're so fucking stupid that you believe everyone else is as dumb as you.
If this law, enjoins me as a private individual from saying the words "What did you make at your last job?" then it is a violation of my right to free speech. But because the magic word "employer" gets tacked on to me, it's suddenly OK to deny me the right to say those same words to another adult? Communism FTW!
No. You're interviewing the company just as much as they're interviewing you. If you let them push you around like that you're going to get low pay no matter how many stupid laws there are.
I've had interviews where they don't ask pay. The ones where they did ask I replied by telling them "I want X salary" and never told them what I was making.
you have a vagina doesn't mean you should get paid more.
Climate change is not a controversial subject, it's fact.
Massachusetts's pay equity bill, recently passed, will go into effect on July 1, 2018, and it will prevent Massachusetts employers from inquiring about salary history. It also goes beyond existing NLRA protections for nonmanagers who discuss pay to try to collectively improve their working conditios and adds the same protections for all employees, managers and nonmanagers. http://www.mass.gov/governor/press-office/press-releases/fy2017/governor-baker-signs-bipartisan-pay-equity-legislation.html
Personally, I prefer to just lie and say i make 15% more than I actually do, the last 3 years, and last 3 jobs I've been slowly moving up without doing anymore work