Legally Require All Job Listings to Show Salaries Upfront

We ask the Government to make it a legal requirement that all job listings show salary ranges clearly and upfront. We believe this would create a fairer, more transparent job market, better inform candidates and reduce time-wasting when searching for jobs.

Sources state that 35% of UK job listings don’t list salaries, wasting time and widening wage gaps in various fields such as marketing (People Managing People, 2023). Countries such as the U.S. (in states like California) and the EU already require salary ranges in job postings (HR Dive, 2023; Council of the EU, 2023). We believe that a UK law would ensure fairer pay practices, reduce disparities, and help candidates make informed choices, building a more efficient and transparent job market.

Workers can face challenges in finding good jobs and advancing their careers due to a lack of accessible information on job opportunities, pay, and benefits. This can hinder labour mobility and progression to higher skilled, higher productivity roles with higher wages.

The Government is committed to ensure that workers get a fair and decent day’s pay for a fair and decent day’s work, to raise living standards and put more money in people’s pockets.

Through the Industrial Strategy, the Government is focused on creating high-quality jobs across the country, particularly in growth sectors, and ensuring that economic growth translates into increased wages and improved living standards for working people. The strategy aims to ensure that the benefits of economic growth are widely shared.

The Plan to Make Work Pay supports the delivery of the Government’s Plan for Change by tackling the low pay, poor working conditions and poor job security that have been holding the UK economy back. The Employment Rights Bill is a crucial step in delivering these reforms.

In addition to the commitment in the Plan to Make Work Pay to introduce mandatory pay gap reporting for race and ethnicity and disability, the Government’s Call for Evidence on Equality law (https://www.gov.uk/government/calls-for-evidence/equality-law-call-for-evidence) sought views and evidence to better understand the impact of increased pay transparency on women, people from ethnic minority backgrounds, people with disabilities and other groups in the workplace.