A small revolution is underway in the UK labor market. The government aims to make salary disclosure mandatory in job advertisements. Companies are now encouraged to specify offered salaries even before the new legislation is adopted. The goal is to end job ads that list numerous professional requirements while remaining silent on compensation. This measure is intended to allow candidates to know the financial terms of a position before engaging in sometimes lengthy and demanding recruitment processes. For the government, this transparency is also a way to combat wage discrimination, particularly against women and young people entering the job market.
The figures illustrate the scale of the problem. According to a study by the professional body CIPD, only 41% of UK employers consistently indicate a salary range in their ads, while 18% always communicate a precise amount. On the recruitment platform Adzuna, barely 51% of the offers published in September mentioned compensation. This situation forces many candidates to attend multiple interviews without knowing if the proposed salary meets their expectations. The government assures that its reform enjoys particularly strong support: 94% of participants in a public consultation favored greater transparency, including 93% of responding companies. The government now wants to turn this support into a legal obligation, although the exact timeline for its implementation remains to be determined.
A reform that could also transform recruitment in France
Beyond candidate convenience, this reform pursues a more structural goal: reducing pay gaps and facilitating access to employment. Salary transparency could notably help women better identify differences in treatment and negotiate their pay with more information. It could also benefit young workers, often less experienced in professional negotiations. Some employers nevertheless point out that compensation depends on experience, skills, and candidate profile, which sometimes makes displaying a single amount difficult. Others fear the multiplication of particularly wide salary ranges, which could limit the effectiveness of the system. The government will therefore need to specify the terms of this obligation and any sanctions applicable to companies that do not comply.
In France, a comparable development is also underway but within a different legal framework. Unlike the UK, which is considering a national reform, France must transpose a European directive on pay transparency by June 7, 2026, a deadline now passed. This text notably requires candidates to be informed of the initial salary or a salary range before their job interview, without necessarily imposing that this information appear directly in the ad. Employers will no longer be able to ask candidates to disclose their salary history. The system also aims to strengthen employees’ rights to obtain information on pay levels and gender pay gaps. The difference between the two countries mainly lies in the modalities envisaged: London wants to generalize salary display from the publication of offers, while the European framework allows more flexibility on the timing of communication. In both cases, recruitment could undergo a lasting transformation, gradually ending the culture of salary secrecy.
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