Workforce Management
October 2008
Under pressure to land top candidates, recruiters and hiring managers may yield to starting salary demands that touch off wage discrimination claims down the road. By Fay Hansen
A recruiter brings in a highly qualified white male candidate to interview for one of multiple openings in a hard-to-fill position.
The candidate negotiates aggressively for a starting salary that exceeds the initial offer, citing a generous total compensation package from his current employer and competing offers from other firms. The new employer caves, meets the candidate’s demands and seals the deal. The employer also hires equally qualified female and black candidates who accept the original starting salary offer without negotiating.
This scenario, played out at hundreds of companies where a particular skill set is in short supply, carries the potential for gender- and race-based wage discrimination charges. The risk of charges stemming from starting salary disparities or reaching back to those disparities is rising as the economic downturn deepens, new legislation moves through Congress and the federal enforcement agencies respond to a recent government report that calls for greater scrutiny of pay practices.
The current economic downturn sharpened just as the Government Accountability Office released a report in August that strongly recommends greater equal-pay enforcement actions by the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission and the Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs. Sponsors of several bills pending in Congress seized on the GAO report to renew their calls for the Senate to pass new bills on pay discrimination that have already cleared the House.
These bills include provisions that increase penalties for Equal Pay Act violations, prohibit employers from retaliating against employees who share salary information and extend the time frame for filing wage discrimination charges. The extended time frame will facilitate efforts by the enforcement agencies and the courts to reach back into starting salary data for evidence of discrimination. In addition, reinforcing the right to discuss salary information may increase pay comparisons and bring more starting salary disparities to light.
Full Article: http://www.workforce.com/archive/feature/25/83/63/index.php
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