On November 18, 2024, New Jersey Governor Phil Murphy signed into law SB2310, which will require employers with 10 or more employees to disclose certain compensation and benefit information in job advertisements. The law will go into effect on June 1, 2025.
In passing this law, New Jersey joins a growing number of states that have passed similar requirements over the last few years, including California, Colorado, Hawaii, Illinois, Maryland, New York City, Minnesota, Vermont, and Washington, DC.
The new law requires covered employers to disclose in each job posting “the hourly wage or salary, or a range of the hourly wage or salary, and a listing of benefits and other compensation programs for which the employee would be eligible within the employee’s first 12 months of employment.” This requirement applies to any posting for “promotions, new jobs, and transfer opportunities” that are advertised by the employer either externally or internally.
The law provides that this requirement does not “prohibit an employer from increasing the wages, benefits, and compensation identified in the job posting at the time of making an offer for employment to an applicant.”
The law also requires that employers “make reasonable efforts to announce, post, or otherwise make known opportunities for promotion that are advertised internally within the employer or externally on internet-based advertisements, postings, printed flyers, or other similar advertisements to all current employees in the affected department or departments of the employer’s business prior to making a promotion decision.” The law defines a promotion as “a change in job title and an increase in compensation.”
An employer is not required to satisfy the announcement requirement for “[a]ny promotion for a current employee that is awarded on the basis of years of experience or performance.” The law also makes clear that employers are not prohibited from making a promotion “on an emergent basis due to an unforeseen event,” however, it does not define what constitutes an “emergent basis” or “unforeseen event.”
The law applies to any “employer” defined as “any person, company, corporation, firm, labor organization, or association which has 10 or more employees over 20 calendar weeks and does business, employs persons, or takes applications for employment within this State, including the State, any county or municipality, or any instrumentality thereof.” Job placement and referral agencies and other employment agencies are also expressly covered. The law does not specify whether the 10-employee minimum includes employees located outside of New Jersey.
The law expressly excludes temporary help service firms and consulting firms registered with the Division of Consumer Affairs in the Department of Law and Safety from the pay and benefit disclosure requirements for job postings posted for the purpose of identifying qualified applicants for potential future job openings. However, this exception does not apply to job postings for existing job openings.
The law does not contain a private cause of action. Rather, the Commissioner of Labor and Workforce Development may enforce the provisions of this law by seeking civil penalties in an amount no greater than $1,000 for the first violation, $5,000 for the second violation, and $10,000 for each subsequent violation.
Each failure to announce, post, or otherwise make known one opportunity for promotion shall constitute a separate violation of the law.
Each failure to include the pay and benefit information required by the law in a particular job posting shall constitute a separate violation of the law.
In advance of the June 1 effective date, covered employers should review all public-facing and internal job postings and advertisements to ensure these materials include the required compensation information. Covered employers should also contact any recruiters or third-party agencies that post job opportunities on the employer’s behalf to ensure they are aware of the law and will comply with its requirements.
Additionally, covered employers should evaluate their processes for advertising promotion opportunities to internal candidates to ensure each department complies with the requirement to notify all employees of promotional opportunities within their departments.
Finally, multistate employers should confirm the company’s compliance with pay transparency laws in other states and localities.
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