X

Age and race affect tech workers' salaries, report finds

A report by Hired, a job search firm, shows tech workers of color ask for and receive lower salaries.

Erin Carson Former Senior Writer
Erin Carson covered internet culture, online dating and the weird ways tech and science are changing your life.
Expertise Erin has been a tech reporter for almost 10 years. Her reporting has taken her from the Johnson Space Center to San Diego Comic-Con's famous Hall H. Credentials
  • She has a master's degree in journalism from Syracuse University.
Erin Carson
2 min read
gettyimages-769715653.jpg

A new report from Hired shows the state of the salary in tech.

Hero Images/Getty

If you work in tech, age and race could have an impact on what you earn, according to a report published Thursday from job search site Hired.

Hired's 2018 State of Salaries report found that white job candidates in the tech sector tend to ask for higher salaries and receive higher offers than black, Hispanic and Asian candidates.

White candidates ask for an average of $130,000 and get about $136,000, Hispanic candidates ask for about $124,000 and get about $131,000. Black candidates also ask for an average of $124,000 but end up with $130,000. Finally, Asian candidates ask for about $127,000 and get about $133,000.

Hired CEO Mehul Patel said the problem could be a lack of transparency.

"You should be asking for what your white, male counterpart is asking," he said. 

Wage disparities are a persistent and long-running problem, regardless of who is asking for what. The Pew Research Center projects that black employees earn 75 percent as much as whites in median hourly earnings, and that women earn 83 percent as much as men.

In tech, some companies have made efforts to close these types of gaps. In 2015, Salesforce re-evaluated employee pay and spent $3 million to even out pay between men and women at the company. In 2016, Intel said it reached pay parity for women and underrepresented minorities.

As far as age goes, salaries for tech workers peak for employees when they are between 40 and 44 years old. The top salaries usually are about $151,000 and then decrease. 

Patel suggested heightened efforts toward retraining might help address the problem, which he says is exacerbated by the fact that newer skills are currently the most sought after. Recent graduates might have a better handle on those skills, making them stiffer competition for older workers.

The report also touched on tech hubs, noting increasing interest in cities like Seattle, Washington and Austin, Texas, where the cost of living is lower than in San Francisco. In fact, when compiling top cities Hired users would like to relocate to, San Francisco didn't even make the top five.