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Comment by strikelaserclaw | Hacker News Reader

I don't get why companies play such games when paying someone. I've been interviewing with companies and even after doing well on the on site, they keep trying to skirt the issue of compensation by asking weird questions like "so how do you think you did?" Its like you know that i did well, otherwise you wouldn't even be talking to me, you are just gauging my confidence level so you know how much i'd be willing to bend when it comes to compensation. I wish they just had standard incoming compensation based on titles or something, its exhausting trying to duke it out with HR when all i want is to be paid fairly and write some code. They aren't doing anyone a favor to underpay because when when people find out, and they will find out, their work quality will decline if they feel they are being used and they will most likely not care about ditching the company for better compensation.

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It allows both sides to negotiate. If you can convince them you’re worth a premium, you can command a premium relative to your new coworkers.

But if you come across looking like a bargain, employers will gladly pay a bargain to have you.

What it boils down to is agency: standardized wages is just another way to fix the price of labor. People that believe they are worth more also believe they should get paid more, and they can use their individual agency to test that theory on an open job market.

It could be agency... but it's just a circus. Do you do the same negotiation for a burger? maybe haggle with wendy's over the number of fries in your order?

If the burger would cost $100k plus RSUs, yes I probably would negotiate for it.

That + if the price of the burger is gonna be locked at that number for at least a year, and you would be locked-in from purchasing burgers anywhere else for that duration.

all expensive items in US have no fixed price and vary based on negotiation outcomes: car, housing. Negotiation is actually a sign of a healthy and competitive market, because there is always a spectrum of talent available, and demand for such talent.

only monopolies can set fixed prices and it leads to inefficiencies

Those aren’t equal. I “haggle” for burgers by choosing the restaurant that will serve me a burger I will be satisfied with for a price I will not be dissatisfied with. For me that’s a local chain that’s fairly consistent and fairly good for more than I will pay at McDonald’s for the same type of dish, but less than half the price of a “better” burger somewhere else. This “haggling” happens before I even enter the store, and influences my choice of stores, but at the end of the day we’re talking about dollars for burgers and fries.

Prospective employer-employee negotiations are an exchange of time into work product in exchange for dollars and benefits measurable in dollars. Time is more valuable than dollars, and I want a good price for it, commiserate with what I think my time is worth, and informed by what I’ve been able to receive in compensation for it in the past because I’m taking a risk by taking the job, including leaving my old job. The employer is also taking a risk, onboarding new employees is costly in both time and money, and they want some idea that you will be worth the money they spent because they expect to make more money than they put into you, so if they can get away with paying you less, of course they will. That’s what makes this a market. I’d rather have a bad lunch I paid too much for and a good employer than a good lunch for a good price and a an employer that doesn’t pay me a compensation I am satisfied with.

I've never been equated to a burger before. That's novel.

Wouldn't workers better be able to negotiate if salary information were public? Like if you think you're worth more than person X, and you know X is being paid Y, it gives you a floor to ask for.

Why would I want people to know how much money I make.

Why wouldn’t you? As a person with a job, are you ashamed of how much you make (either too much or too little)? Or is it a violation of your privacy? If you were a person looking for a new job, you want to know how much people are making in that company (or others in the same market) so you aren’t being undercut for the same job.

No reason why my coworkers should make more or less than me if we have the same title. Making salary information public either through averages per title or ranges (upper and lower) should naturally even out the salaries per title. As things stand, some people are privileged in all sorts of ways when it comes to a company’s undisclosed salary ranges. For example, in my last role I had a friend in the company who could confirm two separate salaries for the role I was applying and I was offered 10% lower than those two salaries. I can ask for a 15% increase in my counteroffer and be confident this is a valid number. If I didn’t have friends who were in the industry that weren’t comfortable sharing salary ranges, I’d have to stick to the Levels FYI site, but my last company wasn’t on there.

When I left, I learned new hires, who were new to tech, earned less than I did when I was at their title. It may be awkward socially to have people know how much I make (or even within a range) but it’s better than the economic disadvantages that unconnected applicants face in today’s job markets. Hope that offers some insight.

> No reason why my coworkers should make more or less than me if we have the same title.

Of course there is. You wrote a book and they didn't. They have more relevant experience than you. The hiring manager really wanted you but you had a competing offer and they didn't. They are young and wanted more equity and you wanted higher cash.

There are a whole host of reasons why people in the same title can make wildly different salaries - they're not all nefarious.

All the reasons you gave are really bad reasons! Do you really think that it's fair and normal that someone gets a much higher salary than you while doing the same exact job (and let's assume, performing at the same level) just because she had another offer at the time of hire?? That's ridiculous. It goes even against the interests of the company itself as it's logical to think they might have other candidates like you who are happy to accept the salary offer and won't be able to leverage it to get another, better offer (if that happens often, clearly the company is just underpaying, but for the discussion about whether the difference in salary is justified by only the circumstances of the candidates, we assume that's not the case).

It's very unlikely both people are performing at the same level. Everyone has strengths and weaknesses.

Whether I think it's fair or not is irrelevant, it is normal/standard practice that getting multiple offers simultaneously will increase your compensation across most or all of those offers.

And how is it against the company's interests to pay its employees a salary they'll accept?

Why not?

Seriously. I'm not saying it should necessarily be public information, but "I don't wanna" isn't a good reason for anything. What damage is done to you because someone knows you make $45k vs. $145k vs. $445k? You are not harmed in any way. But the people making $45k while all their coworkers are making $95k have some information that they can use to objectively improve the lives of them and their families.

I say this as someone who is the highest paid person on my team. I stand to gain basically nothing from having salaries published, whether anonymous or not. But I still think it could be done in a way that helps underpaid and underrepresented people.

"I don't wanna" is a perfectly good reason for a lot of things. And for me, this is one of them.

Well you said why would you want to and I gave a handful of valid reasons. You don't have to engage if you don't want to but that's sort of what this place exists for.

Not the person you are responding to. He seems not keen on engaging with you here.

I agree to most of what you say.

Having said that, trying to answer your question:

> What damage is done to you because someone knows you make $45k vs. $145k vs. $445k? You are not harmed in any way.

Many people believe, probably not incorrectly, that the salary line item in the budget is a fixed one. Hence, it is a zero-sum game. If their colleague negotiates better pay, their own pay will be negatively impacted, in this world view.

Yep, this would be all fine and good if there were symmetrical information. But there isn't.

this, it is hard to negotiate with companies where you have no info on what they are paying others at your level

To be fair on the hiring side, reality is that many job postings are open ended on comp depending on who shows up. Even at large (>10K people) companies, certainly in startups.

The posted job might be for a senior engineer, but if an extremely promising recent grad shows up maybe I'll take a bet on them instead, but they'll start on a lower salary. Or sometimes an extremely experienced person shows interest and they're a perfect fit so they end up getting hired at a distinguished level which wasn't the plan but the stars aligned.

It's not useful to post the job with a range of 50K-400K, but it's sort of what the range really is.

Which is what "standard compensation based on titles" would solve. If you come in for a senior position but you get your hypothetical star college grad you say, "we don't think you're ready for the senior position but we'd hire you as a mid."

Titles are incredibly malleable and don't always line up to comp. And situations are almost always complicated by external factors. Not all employers are enormous Microsofts/Googles either, where there's a line out the door of candidates.

E.g. Imagine you have a software business with < 20 total staff. What would you do in this situation:

Candidate is interviewed and we think they would be a good fit for the role, say it's a mid level role. We're desperate to fill it as we have xyz project to complete. The candidate has an offer somewhere else that is 15k higher than the usual mid-level title compensation. They say "I'd love to work with you, but money is important to me right now as I'm saving to buy a house".

Do you...

1. Offer the standard, lower mid-level amount, lose them to the other offer and allow the business to suffer a larger impact.

2. Match the other offer and undermine your "standard compensation based on titles" rule.

Either option is problematic and compounded by pay band/published salaries rules.

If you overpay them and then can't give them a raise for a while because they were hired above their pay band, then they will be annoyed/offended and may leave. "Sorry we overpaid you when you were hired so no raises for a while until you can progress to the next title"

If you overpay them and everyone's salaries are published internally, then their peers will be annoyed and demand the same salary, which your business can't afford.

If you don't hire them you are letting a hiring rule affect your broader business strategy and risk missing out on opportunities that would benefit the whole team.

This has been my experience. Yes this is quite one dimensional, and money isn't always the driver. But sometimes it is, and I think "standard compensation based on titles" is a one dimensional solution.

Open to ideas

If you think they’re worth it you pay them for the next title up and you give them raises commensurate with the position. If not, then find another person. Seems simple to me. It’s not the rest of the team’s problem, it’s the problem of the business to solve. You’re making it sound like you’re doing anything other than caring about profits, as if the rest of your employees care about your problems. If your business of 20 employees will fail due to an extra 15k a year, you’re fucked anyways.

But there is standard trick for that: you give them level salary and sign-up bonus spread over 2-3 years.

Why not just give them the next title up?

If you're looking to hire someone for an Engineer position, and they're demanding Senior Engineer pay, and their skills are worth the money, then why not just call them a Senior Engineer and be done with it?

And worst comes to worst, if they end up not actually being worth the money, you can always fire and replace them once you no longer have a project deadline breathing down your neck.

As you collect more leverage, you get to straight up ignore them when they exhibit behavior.

Until then, punish that behavior by job hopping ever year. If they want to play a game, we can play it too

I don't get why companies play such games when paying someone.

Because (some of them) are narcissistic jerks and play games with others on general principle, just to test their mettle. Or to separate the wolves from the sheep, as it were.

Wouldn't you just end up negotiating the title or band instead? That's what ends up happening at banks where they have that kind of thing.

its much more clear in larger companies where you can see how much people get for a certain role, it is not so clear in smaller startups with not so much public information. In such cases HR do things like "So whats your number".

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