The New York City Council has approved and sent to Mayor Bill de Blasio for his expected signature an ordinance that will prevent city employers from inquiring about the salary history of job applicants. The New York City action comes a few weeks after approval of a similar measure by Puerto Rico.
In a related development, a salary history inquiry ban scheduled to go into effect in Philadelphia on May 23, 2017, has been put on hold by the city pending a legal challenge to the ordinance filed by the Chamber of Commerce for Greater Philadelphia challenging its constitutionality.
Laws banning employers from asking about salary history are ostensibly designed to address gender pay disparities by preventing a woman’s current and future wages from being suppressed as a result of the persistent gender-based pay gap between men and women. Opponents, primarily employers, argue that such restrictions are overly burdensome and harm businesses by excluding important information from the hiring process.
Although numerous proposals to enact such bans have been introduced nationwide, thus far Massachusetts is the only other jurisdiction aside from those discussed in this memo that has enacted a salary history inquiry ban.
Members of the Equal Employment Advisory Council (EEAC) can read more here.