The world we live in keeps changing and as it does, so must we. A recent drastic change that many states in the US are making is passing legislation that increases pay transparency by requiring salary disclosures on job posts. But what exactly is changing and how do these changes affect you? And what is Randall Reilly doing to navigate these new rules? These are some of the questions that we’ll be answering today.
Why is this happening?
This new legislation is primarily being adopted to increase transparency and combat a growing secrecy around pay that didn’t used to exist. According to Andrea Johnson, Director of State Policy at the National Women’s Law Center, this trend became more prominent following the financial crisis of 2008.
Pay disclosures became more restrictive during this time because the “power dynamics in hiring shifted.” Job hunters found that they had less negotiating power due to the economic downturn, and as a result, employers began to hold their cards a little closer to the chest.
Additionally, some states are actually seeing some benefit from being more forthcoming with their pay expectations. Recent research in Colorado (one of the states that have implemented these laws) shows that although there has been a decline in job postings by employers, there has been a notable increase in the state’s labor force participation rate.
Our team on our Stratas Reach recruiting platform have also been doing some research and have discovered some interesting things. They have found that job postings that include pay information increase application volume by 65% and decrease cost per application by 15%-20%.
Publicizing salaries can be time-saving for employers by attracting interested job-seekers and weeding out the ones whose expectations don’t match the disclosed salary levels.
What Changes Are Being Made?
The bad news is the legislative landscape varies from state to state and city to city. There are also differences in what information must be provided and when it has to be disclosed to an applicant in the interview process. However, the common thread amongst all of the legislation being passed is salary transparency.
In most cases, the new rules revolve around companies being required to disclose the expected salary range either in the actual job post or upon request by the new applicant. There have also been additional rules enforced including these same disclosure requirements for current employees that are transitioning into new roles or applying for promotions.
Some of the states that have introduced their own versions of this new legislation are California, Washington, Nevada, and Colorado. If you want a breakdown of each state that has adopted new legislation and the details of their new laws, you can find more information in this PDF download.
How These Changes Affect You
There have been many legislative changes in the past few years and that is likely to continue across the country with more and more states adopting these salary transparency laws. But the ultimate question is, “How do these changes affect you and your business?”
We here at Randall Reilly have been doing our research. After running an analysis of zip codes, we found that if a company is running employment in all 50 states, these new laws will affect about 11% of zip codes throughout the country (with that number expected to increase as more states adopt similar legislation).
This ultimately impacts you by increasing disclosure requirements between you and your applicants, and in some cases even current employees. While there is an obvious financial incentive in not outright disclosing this information, there is also a benefit in being more open with the pay that you are offering. With more transparency comes more genuine interest from qualified employees and a reduction in the time it takes to fill a position.
What is Randall Reilly Doing?
To start, we are working with our clients to include salary data for positions on all job boards that we host and through our Stratas Reach recruiting module. We are taking these steps in order to address the changes being made in the states that have adopted these new rules and ensure we all in compliance with them.
If for some reason companies are not able to include this data, we will exclude those jobs from running in the affected states and cities to legally protect our clients and bring the job postings into compliance with the new laws. Additionally, all job postings located in the states mentioned above that appear on our landing pages will require salary data to be included prior to January 31, 2023.
For our CareersInGear page, if clients submit job postings to run on the site but do not include salary data, we will once again exclude those jobs from appearing in the affected locations. However, as soon as salary data is provided, we will update the campaigns to run in those locations with the appropriate information.
In regards to GetTruckerJobs, this is generally a multi carrier aggregate site, meaning that driver information is collected and then sent on to fleets to use for their normal recruiting operations. However, if jobs are posted on the GTJ site, these postings require salary information as well.
Wrapping Up
These changes are important because they affect your job posting requirements which can impact your ability to hire new drivers. However, it’s important to understand that these new laws also have the ability to actually improve hiring, especially during a driver shortage.
Complying with these laws and providing this information can attract more qualified drivers to apply and will allow the industry to combat the amount of secrecy around pay that has grown over the past decade.
As you conduct business in the states that we discussed, it’s important for you to be aware of the new job posting requirements and to understand that these new regulations are likely to spread across the country in the coming months and years.
If you would like to know how Randall Reilly can help you build better job posts, click here to learn about Stratas Reach.
