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Comment by josephd79 | Hacker News Reader

They just have to post the minimum and maximum starting salary for the position. I'm having a hard time seeing how this solves anything.

Employers can easily get around this by using ad copy saying "Starting salary between $15k and $50k yearly depending on experience blah blah blah.."

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The law has a "good faith" provision. More importantly, perhaps, if you post unrealistically low minimums you won't attract candidates. If you post unrealistically high maximums, your workers will be upset that they are underpaid vs what you say you pay.

In tech jobs the same job posting could just have a range that goes from basic engineer all the way to the highest possible principal engineer pay, since the posting is for the domain area not the specific level of experience. Govt jobs are often like this too, giving a range of levels and a big range of possible salaries, especially when they include the possible geographic variation in pay.

You still wouldn't know whether others with 8 years experience and a MS or whatever, make more or less than you do.

Interestingly, this hasn't happened in places where pay is required! Companies split up their postings by title/level to make sure candidates know their time won't be wasted at their level.

I think I'd still prefer to know what the upper range is. I sometimes get emailed jobs where the upper range is 30% lower than my current salary for the same work with worse conditions (usually longer hours with less holidays). These are a waste of time for everyone involved so when they're coy about it it's doubly irritating.

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