Slashdot is powered by your submissions, so send in your scoop

 


Forgot your password?
Close
typodupeerror
×
United States

Newsom Signs California Pay Transparency Bill SB 1162 (protocol.com) 128

Posted by msmash from the shape-of-things-to-come dept.
More pay transparency is coming to California. The Golden State is joining New York City, Colorado, and Washington in requiring employers to disclose pay ranges in job ads. From a report: Gov. Gavin Newsom signed Senate Bill 1162 into law on Tuesday, according to statements from the California Legislative Women's Caucus and the TechEquity Collaborative. Under the law, employers with 15 or more workers will be required to include pay ranges in job postings, and those with 100 or more employees or contractors will have to report median and mean hourly pay rates by job category and "each combination of race, ethnicity, and sex."

"This is a big moment for California workers, especially women and people of color who have long been impacted by systemic inequities that have left them earning far less than their colleagues," said state Sen. Monique Limon (D-Santa Barbara) in a statement. Limon introduced the bill in February. The TechEquity Collaborative's chief programs officer, Samantha Gordon, praised the law in a statement as "an important step in equalizing the playing field for the 1.9 million contractors, temps, vendors, and contingent workers" in California. Companies will have to comply by January 2023.
This discussion has been archived. No new comments can be posted.

Newsom Signs California Pay Transparency Bill SB 1162 More

Newsom Signs California Pay Transparency Bill SB 1162

Comments Filter:

  • From $1 to $100,000,000 depending on experience and success rate".

    • Re:"Pay Range: (Score:5, Informative)

      by omnichad ( 1198475 ) on Wednesday September 28, 2022 @12:45PM (#62921411) Homepage

      And then include the median and mean as required.

      • Re:"Pay Range: (Score:4, Interesting)

        by Pascoea ( 968200 ) on Wednesday September 28, 2022 @01:06PM (#62921499)
        I fail to understand why people are so butt-hurt over this kind of information being made available. I mean, I have to assume people are concerned that others will find out that they are severely overpaid, or that their peers are severely underpaid and leveling the playing field will take money out of their pocket. I'd argue that without this information being published you, as an individual, have no actual clue if you're underpaid or overpaid.

        • I also don't negotiate. I'll walk away from a job offer or a car dealer if someone tries to make a bad offer. But I won't waste time or play games.

          • Re: (Score:2)

            by Pascoea ( 968200 )
            I am fortunate enough to be in a position that I'm able to do the same, there are a lot of people that aren't. But wouldn't it make things easer when the employers expectations are up front? If you see the job is listed for 100k and you need 150, that saves you a bunch of time.

            • If you're in no position to walk away from a job offer, you're also in no position to negotiate the price.

              • Re: (Score:3)

                by Pascoea ( 968200 )
                That is a fair point, but not really a viable argument against making the data available.

          • I also don't negotiate. I'll walk away from a job offer or a car dealer if someone tries to make a bad offer. But I won't waste time or play games.

            Is traveling to other car dealers less of a waste of time compared to 20 minutes spent negotiating at the first car dealer?

            • Re: (Score:1)

              by Anonymous Coward
              If the original car dealer wants to hide their "we'll sell at this price" point, then they're willing to hide things that are wrong about the car being sold. A seller wants you to haggle? Let them have someone else as their sucker.

              • Re: (Score:2)

                by piojo ( 995934 )

                If the original car dealer wants to hide their "we'll sell at this price" point, then they're willing to hide things that are wrong about the car being sold. A seller wants you to haggle? Let them have someone else as their sucker.

                I don't have car sales all figured out, but I do know that that's not how it works. A salesman has no incentive to reveal his break-even point. Why would you expect him to? Altruism? He wants a commission as much as you want a good deal on a car.

                Behavioral economists would say you'll feel good (fair) when you split the difference between the lowest amount he'd sell for and the highest amount you'd pay. But deciding how much one would pay or how much one would sell for is actually a complicated analysis. (Th

        • There are ways to find out whether you are overpaid or underpaid. Sites like salary.com can help you. Who really cares if the specific company you are applying to, has a lower-than-typical salary range? What matters is, what is your salary expectations based on market conditions. If the company's pay range is too low, move on. If it's too high, one must ask why it's too good to be true.

        • Re:"Pay Range: (Score:4, Insightful)

          by Alascom ( 95042 ) on Wednesday September 28, 2022 @01:35PM (#62921613)

          >I fail to understand why people are so butt-hurt over this kind of information being made available.

          TL;DR - Bad data is worse than no data.

          I can understand how you feel, so let me try to explain.

          As background, my example is based my own experience where I was compensated close to $1m year while other engineers in my "job and level" were paid the same salary and bonus as I was in the $150-$170k range in the companies "publicly disclosed" gender & minority pay transparency report.

          We can probably agree that bad, misleading, or inaccurate data is worse than no data. Right?

          A tech company can disclose data that they pay an engineer at level X a range of $125-$150k. They can also disclose that men, women, and minorities are all perfectly equal at that level and in that pay range. Compliance met, law fulfilled. We all feel better. Almost all big tech companies already disclose this information.

          Meanwhile, some of those level X employees are given stock & retention stock grants that exceed $800k per year which is NOT required to be disclosed. Most probably deserve the extra compensation, some only receive it because of their "buddy network" (which has always existed and will continue to exist).

          End result, the data is worse than nothing - it is factually incorrect and intentionally misleading... The eventual solution will be we will need yet another law and another political donation for yet another election cycle where the slick politician keeps stringing people along with feel-good measures that actually accomplish nothing except ensuring the politician keeps his power grabs moving forward.

          • Re: (Score:3)

            by narcc ( 412956 )

            So what you're saying is that the law should be required to disclose total compensation as well? Who wouldn't agree to that?

            • Re: (Score:2)

              by Pascoea ( 968200 )

              Who wouldn't agree to that?

              Companies/people who have things to hide. I feel as though that is the largest driver for the pushback against initiatives like this.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by Hodr ( 219920 )

          The people who are "overpaid" as compared to their counterparts definitely know it. You don't accidentally get offered a good deal more money than others in your position, you have to hustle for it.

          • Re: (Score:2)

            by Pascoea ( 968200 )
            And they KNOW this information how? I FEEL like I'm paid on the higher end of my team's range, but I sure as hell don't KNOW that. The only think I know is what I'm paid, the only way I could possibly know how that compares to my 5 teammates is to directly ask them. Unfortunately that is taboo in this country. Unless you got a hold of your boss' compensation spreadsheet, or had the balls to ask your coworkers, you don't know anything.
          • Not always. When I was promoted to a more senior position in my department, I was given a raise. For several years, I thought that everybody moving into that position got the same raise, but I eventually learned that I'd also been given a merit raise, meaning that I was paid a little more than the other seniors. And, as our annual raises were a percentage, my rate just kept getting farther and farther ahead of everybody else's.
        • Salary min/max is fine, but the rest of it could potentially expose people's private payroll information. In a company of 100 people, it's not that far-fetched that there's only one black female with a particular job title.

          • Re: (Score:2)

            by Pascoea ( 968200 )
            It says in the article that the data isn't published publicly, at least not in that detail.
        • I fail to understand the impact. I see hospitals always advertise a range for IT jobs. $68,000 - 102,000 for example. It wont matter if you came in with 30yr experience and 3 phd. They will offer you $68k, and claim its so you have room to grow. Later they perpetually fuck you with 1.2% raises that also slide the scale by 1.2%. End result is you are always at the low end while in that position. The range itself is a complete illusion. At any time you can also lookup an employee and see what their salary or

          • Re: (Score:2)

            by Pascoea ( 968200 )

            They will offer you $68k, and claim its so you have room to grow.

            Negotiations are a two way street. If you don't like the offer, tell them to kick rocks.

            At any time you can also lookup an employee and see what their salary or hourly wages are.

            Care to expand on that? I certainly don't have access to such a tool. I guess you could say I did at a prior company. For troubleshooting purposes I had full unfettered access to our accounting software, but I was never dumb enough to go rifling through places I had no business being in.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by CAIMLAS ( 41445 )

          I think it's generally a good idea. There are two, related, implicit problems I see with it, however:

          1) There is no criteria specified for a) time in position, b) time in career, or c) relative proficiency in said job. You can have 2 individuals with the same position, drastically different responsibilities, and different amounts of experience - and this is going to be more substantial with larger organizations where you might have people with the exact same titles, and very similar position descriptions, w

        • The problem is that there are legitimate intangibles that make someone a better fit for a job or promotion or even just simple merit raises. There can still be SIGNIFICANT differences between 2 people who both may be performing 100% of the bare minimums of their job description, but one of them may take every single bit of vacation/sick/PTO/comp time available to them while the other person doesn't and also same with being available for emergencies. I shouldn't have to explain to someone why they are making

          • Re: (Score:2)

            by Pascoea ( 968200 )
            That's the thing, though, they aren't asking for published individual salaries. It's requiring a salary range for posted open positions. The rest of the data they are asking for is used for internal government reporting, and not published.

          • 2 people who both may be performing 100% of the bare minimums of their job description

            one of them may take every single bit of vacation/sick/PTO/comp time available to them while the other person doesn't

            So one of these people performs 100% the same amount of work as a workaholic but they do it in less time and are healthier. I'd take that second one any day.

        • Because I'm a fairly private person in general. My personal finances are personal and (at the moment) private. And I prefer them to remain so. Why? Because I'm a fairly private person in general. I have other reasons too. But no other reason should be necessary.

        • The fact of the matter isn't a question of being butthurt about salaries, but rather it being none of your business how much I make. Period.

          • Re: (Score:2)

            by Pascoea ( 968200 )
            Good thing that sort of information isn't what's being made available to the public. The salary ranges listed on job postings for positions similar to yours don't reveal how much YOU make, but it would give you an idea on if you're getting screwed or not. And the data reported to the gov't doesn't include your name (as far as I could tell) and the data is not published.

      • I'm sure employers will screw with job titles to get around useful numbers. IT job titles are already convoluted such that doubling the convolution won't be a problem. Many are invented out of managers' asses. And gov't auditors often don't know enough about IT to clamp down.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by rta ( 559125 )

          literally yesterday i had to pull a new title for myself out of my ass because i had to get a promotion for "reasons", but it couldn't be the normal title (also, of course, for "reasons"). It was announced today. I also apparently got a pay increase. (You could call it a raise, but it's less than inflation over the past year. (and there's no automatic annual adjustment :-/ ) )

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Rinikusu ( 28164 )

      Honestly, that's better than nothing. At least looking at that ad I would know that working for them will probably shit shitty if they can't even give a real pay range and save myself a lot of time.

  • Sure. Conform and then work around. (Score:3)

    by Petersko ( 564140 ) on Wednesday September 28, 2022 @01:00PM (#62921475)

    "I know you applied for this job with these salary ranges, but rather than fill that post, but we think you might be better suited for this position with these different ranges."

    "Oh, that original post? We deemed it redundant and closed it without filling it."

    • There are lots of laws you can get around by running your business poorly. Meanwhile everyone with the same job description as the advertised position asks for a raise.

      I'm sure there is some slashdotter restaurantour who tried laying off his waitstaff as they entered the bathroom and hiring them on the way out to evade the "Employees must wash hands" tyranny of the woke state.

    • The problem with doing that is that you don't really get to get them to accept the position the same way. Bait and switch works better with raw salaries. When you try to do it with entire positions in order to get away with it you would need to show the positions were sufficiently different and not in fact the same position under a different name. Otherwise a jury is just going to convict when it comes up in court.

      If you were in a red state with pro corporates packing the judiciary you could get away wi
      • Ranges themselves are entirely bait and switch. Ive seen plenty of hospitals advertise a range knowing that they never expect to hire at anything above the bottom end regardless of experience and education. $73,000 - $150,000 really means $75k AT BEST

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by lobotomy ( 26260 )
          I have seen that many times at universities. Candidates see the high end and their eyes light up. Management budgeted for the low end. You would have to be an exceptional candidate to ever get hired at the midpoint.

  • Each combination of race, ethnicity, and sex? Job ads are going to be HUGE.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Hodr ( 219920 )

      I'm sorry, you forgot to list the median income of your non-binary white Eritrean-Americans.

    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      by narcc ( 412956 )

      The solution: Stop underpaying women and minorities.

      • You can't stop what you never started.

        The solution to discrimination in wages is not to enforce discrimination.

        I expect this to backfire in any of a number of ways. If a court case doesn't take it down immediately then it could trigger all kind of complaints until it does.

        • Re: (Score:1)

          by narcc ( 412956 )

          You're going to deny reality? Then fuck off. I don't have time for trash that can't accept basic facts.

  • Employees should talk about their wages (Score:5, Insightful)

    by FeelGood314 ( 2516288 ) on Wednesday September 28, 2022 @01:45PM (#62921643)
    You should feel no shame in revealing your wage and companies should not be allowed to make you feel guilty or punish you for revealing it. Knowledge of your salary and that of others gives workers significantly more power in negotiations. We want the employee/employer relationship to be as level as possible and this asymmetric knowledge is in some fields the biggest advantage employers have.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by ibpooks ( 127372 )

      We want the employee/employer relationship

      No, YOU want the relationship to change. There are already tools out there like salary.com, glassdoor.com, various others for the people who want to voluntarily disclose their personal income information for others to see.

      What this bill does is effectively dox those people who would rather keep their financial information private. The reasons for that don't matter. It's their business; not mine or yours. I guarantee there is more than enough information disclosed by the mandatory reporting requirement o

    • Then no one should be surprised when the end result is that everyone will make the same wage, regardless of performance. Because any other condition will immediately result in every other employee bitching that someone makes more than them and / or threatening to sue, and management ain't dealing with that. Poof! You now all have the same "equity," no matter if you're a complete grind / top contributor or a lazy-ass slacker. That's what you wanted anyway, because merit is really just a myth created by u

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by iNaya ( 1049686 )

        As a fairly friendly person, I happen to know what most of my direct colleagues are paid. I know some incompetent but arrogant people that get paid a lot more than other extremely competent people. It seems people get paid depending on how good they are at convincing HR that they are good. So personally I don't really care about how the pay is decided. It's never gonna be fair - we could make it based on objective factors like 'years of experience' and 'certificates achieved' rather than easily fudged thing

        • Re: (Score:1)

          by Tyr07 ( 8900565 )

          That's why pay will never by fair, exactly what you said.

          Because those people who are just 'good at raising their own flag' could be the lowest performers and will still demand they get more money and that it's not fair and discimrination.

          Real world 101, almost everyone feels they are better than everyone else and should be the top, and if they aren't it's not them it's everyone else, discrimination and not fair.

          Good luck.

      • Re:Employees should talk about their wages (Score:4, Interesting)

        by luvirini ( 753157 ) on Wednesday September 28, 2022 @05:14PM (#62922307)

        >Then no one should be surprised when the end result is that everyone will make the same wage, regardless of performance

        I would be somewhat surprised at least as that that is not what happens here in Finland at least.

        Here you cannot know the salary information in real time, but tax data is open to all. You can and I know many people who do, go to the tax office the next year and look up your coworkers tax information for free, they have specific terminals there for that searching, as they do not want people to do "bot searches" and to spend some effort on it, but searching say 50 co-workers salary information takes way less than an half an hour if you do not want to write each one down separately, but just get the things like a feel for the range and high and lows and similar.

        So if you are nosy or feel that you might be slighted you can check easily afterwards, and yet there are meaningful pay differences based on things like performance.

    • Employer accepts your offer. You bid too low. (Score:5, Insightful)

      by drnb ( 2434720 ) on Wednesday September 28, 2022 @03:07PM (#62921957)

      We want the employee/employer relationship to be as level as possible and this asymmetric knowledge is in some fields the biggest advantage employers have.

      Which is why employers push job seekers to reveal their expected salary range. The first side to reveal a range is at a disadvantage in the negotiation.

      Car dealership accepts your initial offer. You bid too high.

      Employer accepts your initial offer. You bid too low.

    • Because, obviously, regular people never ostracize you for your income.

  • Ouch (Score:3)

    by stikves ( 127823 ) on Wednesday September 28, 2022 @01:47PM (#62921653) Homepage

    This might actually be good for companies, but not for potential employees. Except for maybe your first job.

    Tech workers stay on average about two years on a job: https://developerpitstop.com/h... [developerpitstop.com], and then jump ship for a raise. That means you'd eventually push "beyond" these ranges. And recruiters will normally accommodate demands beyond the range. It just needs a simple ask.

    It is usually extra bonus, or stock options, not base pay. But still, with this change they might easily say: "nope, unfortunately we cannot give you more, the law binds us". And that means you'd stay at your old job, with a below inflation rate "cost of living adjustment", or try to interview for level+1. And level+1 might not always be as easy.

    • And that means you'd stay at your old job, with a below inflation rate "cost of living adjustment", or try to interview for level+1. And level+1 might not always be as easy.

      Or you leave California, like so many are already doing.

  • My linkedin account lists the minimum salary I'll accept. 90% of head hunters come to me with job offers that pay half that or less. Most of the time I suspect they are just trying to fill some quota of qualified applicants knowing ahead of time there is no chance I will accept.

  • If minorities and women are getting paid less for the same work then I'd expect companies to hire only minority women and rake in the profits.

    This is all a bunch of virtue signalling based on a false premise. Real virtue has a cost associated with it. Virtue signalling costs nothing because it has all the outward appearances of virtue but no real costs attached to acting them out. Newsom can pass this bill because it costs him nothing, he's not the one going to see his business suffer from the out-of-sta

    • We should be treating people based on the content of their character, not the color of their skin. I recall someone pointing that out as an ideal we should all strive to reach. This is a racist and sexist law, and I'd hope to see it struck down for that reason.

      Protected class information alone is grossly insufficient for anything other than a political analysis, a gimmick to appeal to the base with. Any solution trying to actually address any social inequalities would have professional information along side the protected class information. Years of relevant experience, level of relevant education, etc. Any professional information that could increase a salary needs to be alongside the protected class info.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by narcc ( 412956 )

      If minorities and women are getting paid less for the same work then I'd expect companies to hire only minority women and rake in the profits

      Your expectations are stupid and don't even come close to matching reality. They are undoubtedly being paid less. [americanprogress.org]

      Further [census.gov], white alone or in combination makes up a little over 70% of the population. Even if we pick the lower 62% white alone figure (down over 8% since 2010, better panic right wing nuts) that leaves less that 20% of the population as minority women and girls. Children obviously don't work, and many of the remainder will be "white passing", leaving employers an awfully small pool from whi

      • Your expectations are stupid and don't even come close to matching reality. They are undoubtedly being paid less.

        I'm not claiming there is no pay disparity. I'm pointing out that if hiring minorities and women gets the same output at lower cost then there's a profit incentive to hiring only minority women. Since we aren't seeing companies hiring only minority women dominating the market then there must be value in how the race and sex are proportioned in the workforce. Maybe there are places that hire a disproportionate amount of minorities and women which are raking in disproportionate profits but I suspect such a

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by narcc ( 412956 )

          I did the basic math for you. Try harder.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by narcc ( 412956 )

          It is to someone's advantage now to "pass" as a minority.

          That's complete bullshit and you know it. No one is clamoring to get less compensation.

  • Intrusive? (Score:3)

    by uncqual ( 836337 ) on Wednesday September 28, 2022 @02:12PM (#62921747)

    100 or more employees or contractors will have to report median and mean hourly pay rates by job category and "each combination of race, ethnicity, and sex."

    In a company with just 100 employees and a fairly wide range of activities (such as a HW company that designs its own hardware, provides support for that hardware, warehouses and ships their own product, has an IT guy/gal, a lab tech or two, a few managers, etc...), this will quite precisely reveal individual's salaries in many cases.

    Why not just publish every employee's salary (like governments in California have to do and third parties publish on web sites) along with race, ethnicity, and sex (gender?). This shouldn't bother anyone who thinks that compensation should be "transparent" and would protect the small employers from having to effectively reveal many individual employee's compensation where big companies don't have to.

    • 100 or more employees or contractors will have to report median and mean hourly pay rates by job category and "each combination of race, ethnicity, and sex."

      Actually its more misleading than intrusive. Where are the years of relevant experience information, where is the highest level of relevant education information, etc? Protected class information alone is grossly insufficient for anything other than a political analysis.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by narcc ( 412956 )

      The simple solution is to just pay everyone fairly, and not discriminate on the basis of gender, race, or ethnicity.

      Wage transparency is good for everyone except shitty employers.

  • it may flatten company hierarchy (Score:3)

    by kiviQr ( 3443687 ) on Wednesday September 28, 2022 @02:18PM (#62921769)
    We will see fewer job categories so ranges can be wide - Software developer - $40k - $400. Or ultraspecific we have new job category just for you.
  • It makes the higher paid feel vulnerable and the lower paid feel underappreciated. A really good way to fuck up team chemistry. If you're happy with your pay, great. If not, ask for more. You'll quickly find out how much you are worth.

  • Are they going to require that these position postings curve based on experience, as well?

    Two people can both work as an "Engineer II", one with 2 years of role experience and 5 in their career, and another with 8 and 12, and the pay be drastically different while their jobs are roughly the same.

    Once you adjust for time in career and time in position, women tend to make drastically more than men.

    Hot take: this will be one of the first things to become readily apparent to the public.

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by Tyr07 ( 8900565 )

      That's what I want too. if an ethnic group / sex has more experience and more credentials, but gets paid less than others in that role, it will be nearly impossible for a company to back peddle on the results.

      It's also carries a risk of people making crap out being outed, so it's a win win in my book.

  • >"each combination of race, ethnicity, and sex."

    So this is a jobs program for race doctors, who will have to sit down and try to figure out averages for every permutation available. Which incidentally is going to be far more than you have people as it requires to break all people based on three separate categories all of which have several possible answers, and grow exponentially with every additional person in the work pool. So more jobs for race doctors.

  • Okay, this is good, it's going to catch some people discriminating against people.

    While you're at it, let's make sure people aren't more equal than others. I want you also to provide the average experience and education / certifications per ethnic background as well.

    That way we'll catch companies dead to rights, when you see a specific ethnic background that has more valid credentials, and years of experience in a role, and gets paid less than other people with less credentials and experience in the role. T

  • Having worked at a public institution that posted all salary ranges, it typically goes something like this:

    "Wanted: programmer ($40,000 to $80,000)"

    Management is thinking 40k or maybe as high as 42k while the applicants are thinking 75k.

    • Having worked at a public institution that posted all salary ranges, it typically goes something like this:

      "Wanted: programmer ($40,000 to $80,000)"

      Management is thinking 40k or maybe as high as 42k while the applicants are thinking 75k.

      In my Canadian province, all public sector pay over 50K/yr are published publicly each year. My wages as a city IT employee were posted each year - not just the range for the job description but our actual income - online for all to see. I see what all my coworkers make. I know the mayor is not the highest paid, the police chief and COO make more. I also see what provincial employees make. I see what doctors (in our public health care system) bill the government. If tax dollars are involved we have ex

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by lobotomy ( 26260 )
        Same here. All state and public university employee pay is public in my state. Probably others, too.
  • This will be interesting in regard to contract agencies. Right now, it is very common for agencies to lie about rates and they shave a hefty percentage off the top, beyond the normal amount withheld for their share of employment taxes (15% or thereabouts). But once the end companies start posting their rate ranges, it will be difficult for third party recruiters to lie. I commonly see recruiters from a certain country shaving off 20 to 30% for themselves. By comparing different recruiter solicitations for

Slashdot Top Deals

BLISS is ignorance.

Close