Beginning this week, job hunters in New York City will have access to crucial data: the expected salary for a listed position.
According to the city’s Commission on Human Rights, employers in New York must, as of Nov. 1, provide “a good faith pay range for every employment, promotion, and transfer opportunity advertised.”
This is an effort to address salary discrepancies for women and people of colour
In an effort to address wage discrepancies for women and people of color, a small but rising number of towns and states around the nation are adopting similar salary disclosure laws.
Salary transparency “gives existing employees and workers information to better gauge how positions within their workplace are valued and whether they are being paid fairly,” according to Seher Khawaja, senior attorney for economic empowerment at Legal Momentum, whose organization assisted in the development of the New York City law.
It offers employers a means of avoiding responsibility
“It puts their feet to the fire to think about how they’re setting pay and avoiding discriminatory practices that were working their way in previously,” Khawaja said.
The execution of the law may be challenging for employers at first. Still, Haris Silic, vice president of Artisan Talent, a staffing firm that puts hundreds of creative workers in New York City and around the nation, believes “everyone recognizes the value.” “Every employer was an employee once,” he said.
Business groups, including New York’s five borough chambers of commerce, have argued that the law could create “dissatisfaction in the workforce and demands to adjust existing salary or pay scales that the employer may be unable to afford.”
The posted maximum may be significantly higher than the historical salary ranges
“During a labor shortage, or in the context of achieving diversity goals, the posted maximum may be significantly higher than the historical salary ranges,” the groups wrote in a letter to the New York City Council.
2019 saw the adoption of pay transparency laws in Colorado as the first state, then in California, Maryland, Nevada, Rhode Island, Connecticut, and Washington, as well as in several localities including Cincinnati and Toledo, Ohio.
There are many disclosure requirements. With exceptions for small enterprises, they occasionally demand that employers give the information upon request or following an interview. Employers must provide wage ranges in other situations.
For instance, a recent job listing on Indeed in Colorado for an executive assistant in Denver listed a compensation range of $57,131 to $88,516 per year. The salary range for a data analyst in human resources was $67,488 to $111,355 annually. Target posted an hourly wage range of $23.75 to $40.40 for a retail position.
The new wave of the legislation marks a change in who is responsible for making salaries transparent
The regulation in New York City is comparable to that in Colorado, except it only applies to companies with four or more employees, not to all companies. According to figures from the state Labor Department, this accounts for one-third of the city’s businesses but about 90% of its workforce.
According to Andrea Johnson, director of state policy at the National Women’s Law Center, the new wave of the legislation marks a change in who is responsible for making salaries transparent. More employers are now held accountable for fostering an open work environment rather than leaving it to employees to determine how their pay compares to that of their coworkers and whether to request fair compensation.
