These astronomical figures became fodder for jokes on social media after reporter Victoria M Walker collected the funniest series in a Twitter thread. “With New York’s wage law now in effect, I’ve looked at some companies’ wage ranges and can already see that the ‘good faith’ part of the law is going to be tested,” he wrote, causing a meltdown. of responses that name and shame such listings. “Looks like I’m going to ask for the biggest number they’re going to give,” one person tweeted. “The low end is the real number, the rest is hoping someone doesn’t realize this and it’s true,” wrote another. New Yorkers have this opportunity to spy potential salaries because the city’s salary transparency law went into effect on November 1st. But anyone who wants to compare their salary to that of a future colleague may be disappointed by comically large ranges. Looking for a gig at Citigroup? Expect to win between $0 and $2 million. As Gothamist first reported, a Citigroup representative blamed its streaks on a “computer glitch.” Although the original pay gap was modified, the salary is still listed between $59,340.00 and $149,320.00. These fixed wages would allow for two very different living standards in New York. In a statement, a Citi spokesperson said: “We are proactively mitigating this issue by reviewing all job postings to ensure the correct range is being reported.” Reporters for the Wall Street Journal and Deloitte did not respond to an inquiry. The law, which applies to both annual and hourly wages, affects all in-person permanent job listings in New York. Remote gigs are excluded. It comes after a similar law passed in Colorado last year, which researchers found led to a decrease in the number of jobs posted but an increase in employment overall, CNBC reported. That law also fell prey to some corporate shadiness: Some companies began hiring out-of-state employees who work from home or leave Colorado altogether in an attempt to circumvent the measure. In New York, so far the only requirement regarding salary bands is that “the employer has a good faith belief at the time of the posting that it would pay for the advertised job, promotion or transfer opportunity.” So here’s the loophole: “good faith” doesn’t carry much weight when companies post listings where the highest rate is nearly double the lowest. According to Gothamist, it’s “unclear” whether the city’s human rights commission will go after these companies with fines for breaking the law. New York City Council member Nantasha Williams, who also chairs the civil and human rights committee, told the Guardian she “couldn’t believe” some of the lines she saw floating around Twitter. “[I thought] “Is this really a post?” he said. “I’m going to the company’s website.” Nandasha Williams. Photo: Michael Loccisano/Getty Images Williams added that the intent of the law was to “eliminate” pay inequality in the city, which disproportionately affects women and people of color. “While it’s fun to see how companies break the law, it’s also quite telling and revealing in terms of the complete violation of what it means to have equity within fees,” he said. While Williams allowed that it was “hard to tell” what falls into the category of reasonable, “bona fide” wages, what she had seen was “pretty blatant.” He has not gone to the human rights commission to address the issue, but plans to. Jeanne M Christensen, a partner at the New York employment law firm Wigdor LLP, believes that “it won’t take long to clarify what is considered a scope that complies with the new law.” “Of course, companies enjoy decades of not having to provide us with this information publicly,” he said. “They’re used to doing things a certain way and this is a big change. They want to stay as close as possible to the old way of doing things.” Christensen added that it could be difficult to litigate cases alleging wage disparities among workers because it can be difficult to obtain evidence of what competitors were actually earning. “If you represent a white woman who claims she has been paid less than her white husband and has no way to get [salary] information, it’s hard to know what’s really going on,” he said. “Transparency is definitely a step in the right direction for traditionally ostracized groups.” Rana Boukhari, 26, works in consulting and change management and is currently job hunting. There were times she went through an entire interview process without hearing anything about pay and received offers that were too low. “It was a huge waste of time,” he said. “If I saw ranges in ads that were below what I wanted, I wouldn’t have applied.” When Boukhari applied for the job last week, she said she saw listings that offered salary bands between $90,000 and $120,000. “It’s a very wide range,” he said. “[It makes you wonder]:”Where am I in this range?” Robin Blaire-Batte, a union organizer with New York’s Communication Workers Local 1180, said she believed a salary range of $30,000 or $40,000 was acceptable for future listings. “[Applicants] they have different levels of experience,” he said. But those $100,000 gaps you see in the listings this week will probably go unpunished. “We don’t expect any of the companies to be fined, at this time,” he said. “The New York City Commission on Human Rights will probably let it go because it’s the beginning of this initiative. But later, if it gets crazy, they will.”
