On July 27, our state’s pay transparency law will be amended to effectively end our short-lived era of actually knowing what a job will, you know, pay.
Since January 1, 2023, companies that posted jobs in our state were required to clearly state the position’s pay, benefits, and any additional compensation. This was an expansion of the 2018 Equal Pay and Opportunities Act. We the working class were finally saved from blindly applying for jobs in the hopes they would pay a living wage. No more going through rounds of interviews just to find out it was actually a “volunteer” position or some other such nonsense. The law also aimed to combat wage disparities across gender, race, and other protected classes.
Under that law, job seekers also had a “private right to action,” meaning if they found a noncompliant post they could theoretically sue the company, with no cap for the penalties a court could impose on the noncompliant business.
Well, the business lobby set out to challenge this law on two fronts: our legal system and our state legislature.
In early 2024, two King County residents filed separate lawsuits over noncompliance with this law in King County Superior Court against Washington Fine Wine & Spirits, LLC, contending that because the company didn’t list a pay scale for jobs they wanted to apply for, they couldn’t compare them with other open jobs on the market or negotiate an offer effectively.
You may think this sounds like an honest mistake by a little LLC. Perhaps we should do what other media outlets have failed to do in reference to this case and clarify that Washington Fine Wine & Spirits, LLC, is owned by Total Wine & More, the alcohol megastore chain with a reported 277 stores nationwide, including 14 in our state, bringing in a reported $6 billion in annual revenue in 2023. A mom and pop shop this is not.
Total Wine appealed these two lawsuits to district court and then to our State Supreme Court in the hopes of getting the law struck down, arguing that the law was too onerous for businesses to follow, that these weren’t “bonafide” job applicants (whatever that means), and that the private right to action was creating a “cottage industry” of law firms taking up these cases.
Let’s stop right there. A business claimed that a state law was unfair, and also thought it was unfair that they could be held responsible for breaking that law. They even went so far as to argue the plaintiffs weren’t “bonafide.” Can you imagine that ever working with other regulations? Have you ever looked at a speed limit sign, thought to yourself, "Well, that’s simply too slow," kept driving above that speed, and then when you got pulled over, told the cop they weren’t qualified to write you a ticket, and set out to get the speed limit permanently changed to whatever number you think is fair?
That’s exactly what happened here. Our state passed a law that businesses simply refused to abide by, and a multibillion-dollar chain used their power to kill it on two fronts.
But the wheels of the judicial system move slowly, and they are still waiting on an answer from the Washington State Supreme Court. Lucky for them, a bill in the state legislature could move faster. Their pro-business bill aimed to do three things: 1) implement a period for businesses to correct the noncompliant listings; 2) cap the penalty for noncompliant businesses; and 3) shift the burden of enforcement to job seekers.
You read that last part right: the business lobby asked the state legislature to effectively deputize workers into enforcing a state law.
If you think this sounds insane, your state representatives don’t agree. On January 21, Republican State Senator Curtis King introduced the original bill, SB 5408, and a largely unchanged version was passed February 28 on a vote of 41-7 with 23 Democrat “yeas.” A decisive win for Big Business. The bill was then sent to the House. It was introduced on March 4, underwent a few minor adjustments in committee, and was passed on April 15 with a vote of 94-1. A blowout.
The one no vote in the House? Jeremie Dufault, a Republican representative from District 15. “I had incomplete information on what businesses would be required to do to avoid liability,” he told The Stranger. “After the vote, I discovered that my concerns with the initial bill had been addressed in the final amendment. I support the bill as passed.”
The bill was then returned to the Senate for a final vote, where only 1 of the original 7 no voters was left standing: Bob Hasegawa, a Senate Democrat who represents Tukwila and parts of Renton and Kent.
So why did this bill get passed, if not on its merits? “I didn’t want to give 5408 a hearing, but as the new Chair of Labor and Commerce, it is important to find ways to work with the ranking minority member of my committee,” says State Senator Rebecca Saldaña to The Stranger. “It is helpful to Senate leadership to have Republican bills so that we can move our priority bills more quickly through the legislative process.“Â
Politics, am I right?
Roughly a month later, on May 20, your Governor Bob Ferguson signed it into law. Just like that: With no real opposition, your state legislature and governor just told businesses that if they don’t like a law that helps working people, they’ll change it until their business buddies are happy.
And boy, are they. Union-busting law firm Littler Mendelson reported the development as “welcome news for the business community and a shining example of bipartisan cooperation.”
According to the new law, if you see a job posted online in Washington State with no description of salary and benefits, you must provide that business written notice that their listing is noncompliant. The company then has five business days to correct it (and likely blacklist you from the job, of course).
If after a business week, the listing is still not following the state law, you can continue your efforts in law enforcement by filing a complaint with Washington State’s Department of Labor & Industries (L&I). If L&I finds that you are correct, the department will attempt to fix the issue with the business via “conference and reconciliation.” If the business still refuses, you can either have L&I assess a penalty or you can contact lawyers to sue—but either way, you won’t get more than $5,000 and may get as little as $100. Good luck finding a lawyer to take that case.
If that feels like a big waste of your time and not worth it for you, that’s the point.
And what will stop that business from just taking down that posting and putting up an identical noncompliant one, which you would have to file a new complaint about?
“We believe the great majority of employers will do their best to follow the law,” says Jeff Mayor from Washington State L&I.
Wishful thinking, maybe.
According to data shared by Indeed’s Hiring Lab, before the pay transparency expansion of the Equal Pay and Opportunities Act was passed in March 2022, over 65 percent of jobs posted on Indeed in Washington State did not include a transparent description of salary and benefits. By the time the law went into effect on January 1, 2023, that number was cut nearly in half to 33 percent.
But businesses in our state were watching those lawsuits closely, and that pay transparency improvement stagnated in August 2024, right around the time that Total Wine & More petitioned King County Superior Court to move the cases up the ladder to district court. Pay transparency has stalled in the year since as businesses waited on an answer from our State Supreme Court and legislature.
According to Indeed, more than 10 percent of their 84,000+ current Washington State job listings still do not include salary information, in violation of the current law. And because this law has now been nerfed to oblivion and stripped of enforcement mechanisms, expect that number to climb back up starting on July 27.
How high it’ll go, only the “free market” knows.
So next time you’re on the internet hunting for a job, clicking through thousands of bare-bones listings, caught in a loop of tedious interviews and lowball offers, please be sure to thank your state representatives.
