For most of modern employment history, salary has been treated as a secret — something employees were expected not to discuss and employers were never required to disclose. That is changing fast. New York has enacted some of the strongest salary transparency laws in the country, and understanding them can give you real leverage whether you are job hunting, negotiating a raise, or investigating whether you are being paid fairly compared to your colleagues.

This post explains what New York's salary transparency laws require, how they interact with your right to discuss pay with coworkers, and what you can do if your employer is violating them.

New York City Led the Way

New York City's salary transparency law — Local Law 32 of 2022 — took effect on November 1, 2022. It requires employers with four or more employees to include a good-faith salary range in any job posting, promotion, or transfer opportunity that can or will be performed, at least in part, in New York City. The range must reflect what the employer actually intends to pay — a range of $30,000 to $500,000 is not a good-faith range. The law covers full-time, part-time, and temporary positions, and it applies to remote roles if the employee could perform the work from New York City.

The New York City Commission on Human Rights enforces the law and can impose civil penalties. Employees who are harmed by a violation — for example, a candidate who was not given accurate salary information and accepted a lower offer as a result — may also have a private right of action.

Statewide Law Followed in 2023

New York State extended salary transparency statewide effective September 17, 2023. The state law applies to employers with four or more employees and requires that any job advertisement for a position that can or will be performed in New York include the compensation range — or a fixed compensation figure if there is no range — along with a job description if one exists.

The state law covers not just external job postings but also internal promotions and transfer opportunities. This is significant: it means that when your employer posts an internal opening, you are entitled to know what it pays before you decide whether to apply. Employers can no longer quietly promote one employee at a higher salary while keeping others in the dark about what the role is worth.

What "Good Faith" Means

Both the city and state laws require that the posted range reflect a good-faith belief about what the employer will pay. This is not a formality. An employer that posts a range of $50,000 to $200,000 for a role it intends to fill at $75,000 is not complying with the law — it is using a fake range to avoid disclosure. Enforcement agencies and courts look at whether the range is genuine, and a pattern of posting artificially wide ranges can itself be evidence of a violation.

If you applied for a job, were offered a salary at the very bottom of a posted range (or below it), and the employer cannot explain why, that may be worth examining — particularly if there is a pattern suggesting that certain employees (women, employees of color, older workers) are consistently offered less than others for the same roles.

Your Right to Discuss Pay With Coworkers

Salary transparency laws work best when employees actually talk to each other. And the law protects that conversation. Under the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA), most private-sector employees have the right to discuss wages, hours, and working conditions with their coworkers. An employer that tells you not to discuss your salary, disciplines you for asking a colleague what they earn, or fires you for organizing around pay equity has likely violated federal law.

New York Labor Law Section 194-a reinforces this protection at the state level. It explicitly prohibits employers from retaliating against employees who inquire about, discuss, or disclose their wages or the wages of others. If your employer has a policy — written or unwritten — discouraging pay discussions, that policy is unlawful.

Salary Transparency and Pay Discrimination

One of the most important uses of salary transparency law is identifying pay discrimination. If you learn — through a job posting, a conversation with a colleague, or a promotion announcement — that someone doing substantially the same work as you is being paid significantly more, and the difference tracks a protected characteristic like sex, race, or age, you may have a pay discrimination claim.

New York Equal Pay Law prohibits paying employees of different protected classes differently for substantially similar work, unless the employer can justify the difference based on a seniority system, a merit system, a production-based system, or a bona fide factor other than the protected characteristic. The burden is on the employer to justify pay disparities — not on the employee to prove they were intentional.

Pay discrimination claims can result in recovery of back pay (the difference between what you were paid and what you should have been paid), front pay, compensatory damages, and in some cases liquidated damages that double the back pay award. Attorney's fees are also available in successful cases.

What Violations Look Like

Salary transparency violations are not always obvious. Common patterns include:

• Job postings with no salary range, or with a range so wide it conveys no real information
• Internal promotion postings that omit compensation entirely
• Offers made below the posted minimum of the advertised range
• Retaliation against employees who ask about pay or share salary information with colleagues
• Patterns of offering lower starting salaries to women or employees of color, even when the posted range is technically compliant

What to Do If Your Employer Is Violating the Law

If you applied for a job that did not include a salary range as required, you can file a complaint with the New York City Commission on Human Rights (for city-based roles) or the New York State Department of Labor (for statewide violations). Keep records of the job posting — screenshot it before it disappears — along with any offer letters, emails about compensation, and communications with HR.

If you believe you are being paid less than colleagues doing the same work because of your sex, race, age, or another protected characteristic, that is a separate and potentially more significant claim. Document what you know about others' compensation, how you learned it, and any conversations with management about your pay. An employment attorney can help you assess whether the disparity is legally actionable and what evidence you would need to pursue a claim.

Pay equity and salary transparency are areas where the law has moved quickly, and many employers — particularly smaller ones — are not yet in full compliance. If you believe your employer is hiding compensation information, retaliating against pay discussions, or paying you less than your colleagues for discriminatory reasons, you have real legal options. I offer free consultations and am happy to talk through what you are seeing and whether it rises to the level of a claim.