By Kathryn Mayer
New data provides more evidence that employers looking to attract talent will want to post salary ranges in their job descriptions or else lose out on potential hires.
In a recent survey of more than 1,000 workers by talent firm Robert Half, 41% of professionals said they would lose interest in a position if the organization didn’t list a salary range in the job description. Another 37% said they’d lose interest in a job if the organization required them to work onsite with no potential for remote work.
The survey is the latest to find that employees are increasingly expecting pay transparency from potential and current employers. Rising employee expectations, as well as a host of new laws requiring pay transparency, have resulted in more employers disclosing salary information over the past couple of years.
“In the era of the ‘Big Stay,’ employers need to take into consideration what workers want and come to the table with competitive offers,” said Dawn Fay, operational president of Robert Half. “With skilled talent at a premium and workers feeling satisfied in their current role, employers can’t afford to make mistakes that could deter prospective candidates from applying to their open positions.”
Overall, the Robert Half survey reiterated the importance of pay among current employees as well. Competitive salary with regular merit increases is the top factor contributing to overall job satisfaction, the survey found. We rounded up additional news on pay transparency and other salary-related topics from SHRM Online.
The Real Effects of Pay Transparency in Business
Employee compensation has traditionally been shrouded in secrecy. Salaries were rarely discussed in polite company, and employers did not disclose their compensation for job openings until making an offer.
But a series of rapidly expanding laws requiring employers to post salary ranges and prohibiting questions about salary history are offering more pay transparency than ever before, creating a foundational challenge—and opportunity—for company leaders.
Recent SHRM research indicates that more than 80% of U.S. workers are more likely to consider applying for a position if the pay range is listed in the job posting. Companies likewise report positive outcomes from posting salary ranges. SHRM research found that 70% of organizations that list pay ranges on their job postings say doing so has led to more applications, and 66% say the quality of their applicants has increased.
Half of Job Ads Now Contain Salary Information
In fall 2023, global jobs board Indeed reported that 50% of U.S.-based job listings on the site now include some employer-provided salary information, the highest share yet recorded. The percentage of job ads with salary information was near 10% in 2019 before the pay transparency movement took off. In a spectacular trajectory, job ads with salary information began to proliferate during the pandemic and accelerated from around 30% of listings in 2022—when more states began to adopt pay transparency regulations—to the current number.
Despite Progress on Pay Equity, 1 in 3 Employers Don’t Have a Strategy In Place
A new report indicates that while a majority of employers are working toward pay equity, there is still work to be done. Nearly three-quarters of employers (70%) said they have analyzed their compensation strategies and shared existing gender pay gap statistics with employees and/or external stakeholders, according to new data from compensation firm beqom. That has led to a number of problems being uncovered, according to beqom’s survey of 875 salary and compensation decision-makers in the U.S. and the U.K., including wage discrimination (cited by 64% of respondents), promotion disparities (57%), below-market salary ranges (54%), pay compression (53%), and gender pay gaps (48%).
In response to some of the pay problems they’ve uncovered, most companies have reported taking steps to close existing wage gaps and foster transparency, the beqom report found.
Those strategies include listing salary ranges within new job descriptions (81%), increasing salaries due to inflation and economic standard-of-living costs (68%), implementing a process for continuous feedback (67%), increasing pay to correct existing pay gaps and salary inconsistencies (65%), providing clear structure for bonuses and performance review processes (65%), and increasing salaries based on performance (65%).
The report finds that “employers are making meaningful progress and taking action,” said Tanya Jansen, co-founder and chief marketing officer of beqom. But it also uncovers a big gap: About 1 in 3 employers (34%) still don’t have a pay equity strategy in place.
The Lowest Salary Employees Would Accept for a New Job Jumps to Record High
Employers looking to hire new talent may have to shell out more money than they have in years.
The lowest average pay that people would be willing to accept to take a new job—also known as the reservation wage—has jumped significantly over the past year, reaching $81,822 as of March. That’s a big jump from November, when, on average, people said they’d need an offer of $73,391 to accept a new job.
The numbers come from the Federal Reserve Bank of New York’s March SCE Labor Market Survey, which explores the reservation wage and other employee expectations in the labor market. It’s the highest level since the survey series began in 2014. Results are published every four months.
