Massachusetts Bans Employers from Asking Applicants About Previous Pay - <AUTHOR> http://www.nytimes.com/2016/08/03/business/dealbook/wage-gap-massachusetts-law-salary-history.html <comment><USER2> I love the US and California, the tech scene is amazing and I was lucky to met such talented and friendly people in about every place I worked... from very large tech cos to "garage" startups.

Which is why it pains me to see that so many engineers get stuck with such ridiculous salaries (relative to the value and wealth they provide and create). Problem is that some salaries are seemingly high compared to what the average worker does in the country but ridiculously to what they would look like if engineers were allowed to capture a greater (that is a >0.01%) percentage of the added value they CREATE.

Most, from the freshly out-of-school to the senior engineer with glowing reviews are getting scammed because they get paid just enough to live a comfortable life but not nearly enough to what they are worth and what they would need to consolidate their place in the upper middle class.

I had one company acquired by a large tech co. Probably going to start another one soon, I won't commit the same mistake twice... engineers need their fair share. They are the one creating things, they are the one on the front line and we should not get satiated by the crumbles we are left with.

<comment><USER3> I am a developer, so I am all for higher developer salaries, but your posts shows a common misunderstanding about economics. The value someone creates has nothing to do with their salary. Their salary is dictated by how many people need to hire developers and how many developers exist to fill those jobs or in simple terms, supply and demand. I might create millions of dollars in value with my code, but there might be another developer that will accept $5k less that can still create millions of dollars with their code. Similarly, the job that 95% of us do really isn't that unique. Sure, each development job has its own challenges and there certainly are a handful of 10Xers out there, but the truth is that once you get to the point of "competent developer" and the meaty part of the bell curve, we are all pretty much interchangeable. It then becomes a question of who will do the same work for less.

<comment><USER4> Your answer also shows a common misunderstanding about economics, because it takes too narrow a focus.

If there exist jobs that produce $1MM in value but that have a going rate of 200k, then there should be more of those jobs: either the company doing the work should expand, or it should have competitors. This will lead to increased competition to hire, which means higher wages. The increased number of jobs might generate downward pressure on the value produced by those jobs (since the output is now less scarce), and the increase in salary should increase the number of people who want to work in the field (which would dampen the salary increase), but we should ultimately reach some sort of equilibrium. The fact that tech companies bemoan how hard it is to find employees suggests that we aren't at this equilibrium.

To give an analogy, your explanation is akin to when people observe that the price of a good is based on the competitive market, and that the cost to produce merely provides (in most cases) a floor to that price. However, that's only part of the story: in a well functioning market large spreads between cost to produce and price encourages competitors to enter the space, which leads to lower prices. There may be delays, and there may be exceptions, but generally the function of competition is to reduce these spreads. Likewise, we should expect competition to reduce the spreads between job value and job salary, generally by increasing salaries and lowering values.

<comment><USER5> >If there exist jobs that produce $1MM in value but that have a going rate of 200k, then there should be more of those jobs: either the company doing the work should expand, or it should have competitors.

How could you possibly determine how much value your efforts are producing? How much value are you assigning to the risk the founder and investors are taking? Maybe your $200k job is producing $200k in value. Or even less.

>The fact that tech companies bemoan how hard it is to find employees suggests that we aren't at this equilibrium.

Tech companies always pretend it's impossible to find employees. That's not reality, though. That's a political strategy.

<comment><USER4> > How could you possibly determine how much value your efforts are producing? > How much value are you assigning to the risk the founder and investors are > taking? Maybe your $200k job is producing $200k in value. Or even less.

I'm not disputing that there's difficulty, and that it might not always be possible (although we can often estimate and assign a confidence level). But the parent comment claimed that even if we did know, value shouldn't pull salaries up: that's what I'm responding to (side note: the parent also implied that we can know what values are, since he acknowledged their use as a floor for salaries).

<comment><USER6> In college I spent a couple summers doing repair work in the shop of a family friend. I got stuck with a boondoggle repair and when it got into day 2 that I was still working on it, and the manager got pissed off and tried to take over for half an hour before he figured out why it was taking me so long. Then we had a shocking conversation about the fact that while he was paying me $x/hr, I needed to be booking at least $10x/hr in repairs, so I needed to work faster. It seemed so unfair to me until I spent a lot more time working in small companies.

The repairs were a profit center, and the labor I was billing was keeping the utilities turned on, buying replacement tools, consumables, paying for my lunch break, covering rework, a hedge against me injuring myself, paying for the shop van I used to run inventory between stores, paying taxes, business licenses, my manager's salary, the owner's salary, paying for Bob to wander over and consult on a repair I wasn't sure about, paying the interest payments on the loans, and covering the loss leaders that got us repeat customers who needed repairs in the first place. Things like trade-ins and entry level equipment.

At your programming job, every manager above you in the chain, every support team that you use to get your work done are all being paid out of the money billed for you. Yes you may be writing $1M in software a year, but the company wouldn't exist and you wouldn't have any sales without those other people, so all of that overhead gets subtracted from your value. Ironically and possibly painfully, a company can exist for months without a single programmer, but it can't exist long without a management chain.

<comment><USER4> I don't disagree with any of this. I'm not saying that if an engineer writes software that increases profits by $1MM then they have realized $1MM in value: it's a team sport. But I don't think that prevents us talking at all about the value of the work that is done in a job.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> I hate this question. I frequently dodge or outright deny answering it. I won't lie about it, I just say, no you don't get that information.

To dodge this question I say the following: "I'm looking for compensation in the range of xxxx to XXXX. This obviously depends on the benefits packages, for an awesome benefits package you may be closer to xxxx, if your benefits are bad then you'll need to be closer to XXXX."

If they persist I follow up with, "I gave you my range if that isn't enough for you then I'm sorry but I'll have to pass, I don't disclose my current salary to any recruiters."

This has worked really well for me in the past.

<comment><USER8> I've followed this advice in the past with mixed results. Some companies do a great job of either respecting this or not asking in the first place. When I interviewed at Uber (a little more than a year back), the recruiter was super persistent. I told them "I understand why you're interested, but it's my personal preference at the advice of personal mentors, not to disclose that information. If we both like each other I'm confident we can find an arrangement that is mutually beneficial." To which the recruiter replied, in person face-to-face, after the 5th time asking: "OK, we can do that. But we have a policy of always making the lowest possible offer to candidates who won't share their compensation information. I just want the best for you." In the end, they very clearly made the lowest possible offer they could and weren't willing to negotiate. It was a cool team, and regardless of if you think they're over-valued a cool company, but it was a very easy "no thank you" for me. That's probably the hardest part of the advice -- you need to be comfortable saying "no" if the negotiation doesn't work out.

<comment><USER9> > "OK, we can do that. But we have a policy of always making the lowest > possible offer to candidates who won't share their compensation information. > I just want the best for you."

This makes absolutely no sense to me. "Oh, we can't use previous compensation to effectively lowball this candidate we like, so we'll ineffectively lowball them instead."

<comment><USER10> It makes perfect sense. If an applicant doesn't want to disclose their previous salary and disclosing it is the cultural norm, that indicates a) they're troublemakers (very privacy conscious or what have you), or b) their previous salary was very low.

You probably don't want troublemakers so there's no point in making them a generous offer. And if the previous salary was very low the lowest possible offer is probably not too far off.

It actually incentivises disclosing your previous salary because unless it was lower or as low as the lowest offer, you'll have a better bargaining position.

I'm not saying the reasoning is particularly ethical or nice, just that it is entirely rational.

<comment><USER9> That's interesting, I hadn't considered it that way. I was looking at it as, "We want this person to work here because they passed our tests, now we wreck the deal for no reason." You're saying the salary disclosure is just _one of the tests_. Makes sense.

<comment><USER10> If it's penalised, I'd say it's likely a "test" (or more of a checkmark). But I wouldn't go so far as to say every employer that asks for your previous salary is testing you.

That said, even if you disclose your previous salary that could affect how you are perceived:

* disclosing it at all without hesitation might mark you as either very open (positive) or untrustworthy (negative)

* if the salary is much lower than expected it might indicate you're not as good as you claim (negative) or that you're bad at negotiating (positive?) or that you left because you wanted a bigger salary (negative)

* if the salary is much higher than expected it might indicate you'll make unreasonable demands (negative) or that you're a strong negotiator (negative?) or that you are underselling yourself (positive?)

Again, it entirely depends on the employer and sometimes a cigar is just a cigar.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> This. Negotiating a compensation package, in general, is asymmetric information warfare. Having to reveal your salary history you may as well not even negotiate.

I know so many women who are constantly bit by this and negotiating in general. Here's an idea: compensation agents who negotiate the compensation package on your behalf. Athletes and actors have them, why not everyone else?

<comment><USER12> Isn't that basically what a recruiter does? Every time I've dealt with a recruiter, they've done the salary haggling for me.

EDIT: I should point out that that's what they do in regards to full-time W2 work, not contract.

<comment><USER13> Be careful about that. The recruiter's incentive is stronger to get more people into jobs that to get one person a little bit more money. It's much like the situation with real estate agents that freakonomics covered in [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=17jO_w6f8Ck](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=17jO_w6f8Ck)

<comment><USER14> A high quality third party recruiter has different incentives than a real estate agent, because they expect repeat business: Few people buy more than two houses in their life, but having a good relationship with a stable of good developers that change jobs every couple of years leads to a far easier and lucrative job in the long run.

There are plenty of awful recruiters who will undervalue you, send you to gigs that don't fit you and such. But it's precisely how bad the field is that makes being a good recruiter such a strategically smart play. Being the rare recruiter that does their job well lands you top talent, that top talent means you can start asking for higher wages for people than the salary bands posted, which leads to more people coming to see you, because you can actually get higher rates than what someone could if they asked up front.

I often ask recruiters what the salary is for the positions they offer. The right recruiter in my town, who I have a work relationship with, will often talk about a 20/hr premium. When compared to the worst (consulting firms that tell you a rate that has nothing to do with what they'll ask the employer, and will hide this) the difference can be huge. I have worked on the same team with another very comparable coworker, and I was getting paid almost triple! and he is an American, not an H1-B.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> _" Companies will not be allowed to prohibit their workers from telling others how much they are paid."_

Companies are not allowed to do that now. That's Federal labor law, and it's been prohibited since 1935.[1] This only applies to employees, not contractors.

[1] [https://www.dol.gov/wb/media/pay_secrecy.pdf](https://www.dol.gov/wb/media/pay_secrecy.pdf)

<comment><USER16> This adds additional penalties at the state level. I'm not a lawyer, but it appears to me to give a $1000 fine.

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> I applied and soon after worked as an engineer for a large company that not only asked for my previous compensation but part of the application process involved my employer validating that I actually made what I told them. They worked with a third party to match my figures with W2 statements and/or pay stubs.

It was really intrusive. Pay should equate to value, not some silly ladder climb

<comment><USER18> I'm sorry that you had to go through this. I agree that it's intrusive and really shouldn't be tolerated.

A while ago, I was in the middle of the job interview process for a company. Having read some rudimentary background on salary negotiation, I was somewhat prepared for how to deflect the "how much are you making?" question.

The next interview was a technical interview, so I wasn't too focused on this aspect of the interview process since I hadn't received a verbal offer. The technical interview went well, but suddenly the interviewer asked "what are you making right now?". Completely clueless, I started talking about the projects I was working on and various technical aspects. The interviewer nodded, and then replied "No, what I meant was what is your current salary?"

I was completely unprepared, fumbled and after some resistance gave up my salary after being told, "this process cannot continue until you tell us your salary". (They also subsequently asked for W2s as proof) I handled this extremely poorly and basically backed myself into that corner. Basically, they negotiated much better than I did, even if it meant resorting to heavy-handed tactics like that. Later on, HR explained this line of questioning to me by saying, "we ask for this information... not to draw a box around you, or anything like that, but so that we can give you an offer that matches everyone's needs".

Long story short, the offer came in at almost exactly $PREVIOUS_SALARY * 1.05. I politely declined.

While this process was painful, I learned a lot from it - always be ready to handle the salary question, even if the interview is supposedly a technical one. If you willingly give up your previous salary, in most cases, you're looking at an offer 5-10% higher at most. (Unless you're an outlier making several standard deviations above the mean) Don't let people box you in.

<comment><USER19> The correct answer to "how much are you making?" is I guess "how much are you willing to pay?"

<comment><USER20> Or "How much are _you_ making? That's just as relevant..."

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> Candidates "may" offer this information upfront? I feel like I'm watching Office Space

"Am I supposed to tell you my salary before even hearing your initial offer?" "Some employees choose to offer salary information, and we encourage that"

<comment><USER22> "We want you to join us for the mission, not for the money. Be a team player and share your salary with us!"

<comment><USER23> "We're into changing the world - we don't care about petty things like _money_ " (CEO who owns 25% of the company)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> Feel free to tell them what you make just add 15-40% to that number. This has worked well for me. Employers seem happy as well.

Example:

Assuming your current salary is X. "So I currently make (X * 1.20), but in order to make the jump I need at least (X * 1.40)."

That way they get to feel out immediately whether they can afford you, you get the salary that would motivate you, and no one is wasting time in the hiring process.

Keep in mind many employers wont want to pay you more than 8-10% more than what you "currently make" unless they are incredibly motivated to hire you and you alone.

<comment><USER25> Works well until an employer does due diligence (ask for proof of your number). In my experience many (not all) do due diligence.

<comment><USER26> I've never had a company ask for proof of income and I wouldn't work at one that did. That's an insane requirement that should have nothing to do with whether or not I'm fit for the job and they're willing to pay what I ask for someone to do the job.

<comment><USER25> I am at a higher end of market salary range and when I tell potential recruiters my expectations and my previous salary they take my desires into account but ask for documentation.

There was a discussion here on HN a couple months ago that this approach is common in such cases.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER27> I started off with a really low salary because I was working as a developer outside the SF bay area and in an industry that paid really low. Then moved to the bay area. Every company or recruiter tries to place you at maybe 5% to 10% more than your current job.

There was a time when I was just hopping from job to job to increase my salary. If there wasn't this convention of paying someone the same I wouldn't have switched so many jobs. There are plenty of places I wanted to stick around but got a much higher offer somewhere else so I pretty much had to switch.

My salary is more than 400% what it was 10 years ago. I feel that I have finally reached market value and have a salary I am happy with. It would have been nice if it was based on supply / demand and how well I interviewed.

That being said, I'm not sure I agree with this law. I like the outcome but not the implementation.

Having a law that says you can't ask someone something seems to violate Freedom of Speech and it sets a dangerous precedent.

<comment><USER28> "Having a law that says you can't ask someone something seems to violate Freedom of Speech and it sets a dangerous precedent."

Like your age, religion, sexual orientation, or if you're planning on getting pregnant?

<comment><USER27> I'm fine with the not discriminating part, it's the asking part I'm concerned with. It seems like censorship and going against Freedom of Speech to me.

A better law would be that employers may not discriminate or refuse to hire someone if they refuse to tell them their previous salary.

Specificity is key, just saying you can't ask feels too overreaching. The intent is to prevent discrimination, not speech.

<comment><USER29> We can't effectively legislate thought yet, although that hasn't stopped legislatures from trying and lawyers from making loads of money arguing over intent. It's incredibly difficult, inefficient and expensive to determine whether an asked question led to a discriminatory decision, so asking is prohibited instead.

<comment><USER30> This is why I dislike anti-discrimination laws too. The way they were enforced probably worked well with manual labor jobs and the like where labor is a commodity for example. Of course, this is why I am willing to compromise and limit the laws to these kinds of jobs.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER31> Massachusetts is doing some good steps to better the work environment and entrepreneurship. This is a nice to have in negotiations and MA challenging non-competes are great things to change[1].

Non-competes are extremely anti-innovation, anti-worker, anti-business and really anti-American. Workers that are skilled cannot be owned. Good knowledgable workers should be compensated to keep them around, not fear of legal threat of using skills they developed.

Non-competes need to go away everywhere.

[1] [http://fortune.com/2016/06/30/massachusetts-non-compete- pass...](http://fortune.com/2016/06/30/massachusetts-non-compete-passes/)

<comment><USER32> Sadly, the MA house & senate couldn't reconcile their two versions of the non- compete bill and it died in committee:

[https://www.bostonglobe.com/business/2016/07/31/noncompete-c...](https://www.bostonglobe.com/business/2016/07/31/noncompete- changes-founder-legislature-frantic-end/W0rbVNv2Cqe0dCScOVD5SI/story.html)

These reform attempts have been going on for years in MA and never make it into law.

<comment><USER33> California's Chamber of Commerce should buy billboard space outside of MIT and Harvard highlighting this, it's a huge incentive for new grads to move to California instead of taking jobs in Massachusetts.

<comment><USER34> > California's Chamber of Commerce should buy billboard space outside of MIT > and Harvard highlighting this

Since employers (who make up the CoC) in California often try to get people to sign non-competes that are unenforceable in California, and to restrain their behavior after having signed them based on the misperception that the agreement _is_ enforceable, its unlikely that the CoC would trumpet publicly the fact that such agremeents are not enforceable in CA as a positive thing.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER35> This is so needed in California. My past personal experience and my friends' experience in the Bay Area shows how hard the recruiters can push for the current salary. What they are saying is that we will give you a 10% raise from your current salary, but not what you and we can agree on is your market price. This is so against letting the markets figure it out.

<comment><USER36> This is _precisely_ letting the markets figuring it out.

Those who offer at most 10% increase when a person's value is 50% higher will find themselves missing the good employees and ultimately, failing.

\---

An example:

How much do I offer for this house? I have have no friggin' clue. But I can look at previous sale prices to get an rough idea. Naturally, I if trust my decision to that 100%, I'll risk making a poor decision. But the previous sales are a piece of information about the market that I ought not ignore.

<comment><USER37> > How much do I offer for this house?

I like the example, but wouldn't it be more parallel to ask "How much have you offered for other houses?" or "How much did your previous house sell for?". The seller would love to know that you are capable of offering more, but you are (properly?) reluctant to give this information.

> But the previous sales are a piece of information about the market that I > ought not ignore.

I don't think there is any dispute that this is valuable information to the person doing the hiring. The question is whether it is fair to the person being hired to be asked this question.

Despite the theoretical disadvantage to the business, the current result seems to be that those who are historically disadvantaged will remain disadvantaged, while those who started out with an advantage will be disproportionally rewarded.

<comment><USER36> Your proposed parallel is backwards. The house is for sale to the buyer; the employee's time and skills are for sale to the employer.

So those question would be more like "How much do you pay other employees?" or "How much have you offered other candidates?"

You can ask those questions. Some employers are upfront, even posting salary ranges in the job ad itself. Other employers will decline to share that information.

Either side can reveal as much or as little information about their employment history as they choose. Curtailing freedoms is a heavy-handed act, despite the theoretical advantage to candidates.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER38> The part of this that looks more important than forbidding recruiters from asking about previous pay is this:

> _" And the law will require equal pay not just for workers whose jobs are > alike, but also for those whose work is of "comparable character" or who > work in "comparable operations." Workers with more seniority will still be > permitted to earn higher pay, but the law effectively broadens the > definition of what is equal work."_

I suspect the result will be to flatten wages everywhere except the most easily quantifiable, thus legally defensible, cases. Sales people will still make a commission on what they sell and have a huge gap in their earnings, but it will become _much_ harder to reward rare engineering talents or even people who work on their craft recreationally.

<comment><USER39> It also means that pay will be determined by judges, not markets, as it is an impossible to define concept. More of the economy will get sucked up into litigation.

Comparable Worth is another incarnation of the Labor Theory of Value, which has long been discredited.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Labor_theory_of_value](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Labor_theory_of_value)

</comment></comment><comment><USER40> I never tell people anyway. I slightly evade the question and say, (in a somewhat annoyed tone), "I'm looking for something in the $X range," where $X is higher than what I actually want. So far, that's worked out fine, since that is the information they actually want to know.

<comment><USER36> Exactly. This should get you a long way.

If it's _really_ a deal-breaker (maybe standard red tape or other BS), I say "My previous/current salary is $W, but I'm looking for $X."

After all, there _is_ a reason you're leaving your current employer, right?

</comment></comment><comment><USER39> I suspect this law may backfire. It's hard enough determining what a prospective employee may be worth to a company, and the salary history is used as a proxy. Take that out of play, and the risk is higher in hiring the candidate. Higher risk means lower pay offers, not higher.

<comment><USER41> In a similar vein, there is evidence that laws which forbid employers from asking about applicants' criminal records on job applications significantly increase hiring discrimination toward blacks:

[http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2795795](http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2795795)

This happens because many employers assume blacks have a criminal record, and asking the question tends to exonerate those who do not, rather than penalize those who do. The default assumption means that things can't get worse if the question is asked, but they can get better.

This law only banned asking the question, not running a background check. But employers don't even get that far, because they presumably do not want to pay for a background check on an applicant they assume has a criminal record.

Of course, this law was intended to have the opposite of its actual effect.

</comment></comment><comment><USER42> I've never understood why this question is such a big deal for people. When asked what you made at your last job, you should just give the number you would like to make at this new job.

<comment><USER37> Some people place an intrinsic value on honesty, and dislike being forced into situations where the advantage is given to brazen liars. I upvoted you since I think this is a topic worth discussing, and probably many others share your view, but I personally find your lack of compunction reprehensible.

<comment><USER42> I appreciate your honesty!

I say that's what you "should" do, because I think it's the most logical way to respond to that question. That doesn't mean I wouldn't feel guilty about lying, and I've never actually had to do it, so I'm not sure how I would realistically respond in the situation.

In my case, my total compensation at my last job is far more than I could expect to earn at a new job anyway, ha!

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> Excellent measure. I remember interviewing at a very large corpo (think one of the main phone carriers), their application process online required applicants to reveal their salaries for the past 10 years. And before making an offer, they were asking for a W2 to make sure you were currently making what you claimed. Needless to say, I laughed at their face and walked.

I assume this law won't apply to questions like "how much are you expecting to make?".

<comment><USER43> There is a lot of salary data available for people through services offered by the credit bureaus. If they want to find out, they will.

<comment><USER44> Well duh, this law isn't trying to keep companies from knowing what the salary range for an industry is, they're trying to keep companies from taking advantage of (usually young) professionals who don't have the power to negotiate fair compensation.

<comment><USER43> I mean they know what your individual salaries have been at previous work- places.

[http://www.nbcnews.com/technology/exclusive-your-employer- ma...](http://www.nbcnews.com/technology/exclusive-your-employer-may-share- your-salary-equifax-might-sell-1B8173066)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER45> What's the use?

Employer: We are willing to make an offer to you. We will offer a base pay of $125k.

Employee: what? I am already making $150k with my current employer.

Employer: Oh..we can't ask your current salary..so we just threw a number at the lower end to see if you would accept.

</comment><comment><USER46> I think is a great step. I work for a big company and has been around for 4 years. when I joined this company, my salary was on par (also justified as per my previous salary). We saw a tremendous amount of growth in the technology and the team has grown by 20X. The people joining now are getting far better salary because either their current salary is high and they negotiate on that OR the company is ready to pay more for filling up the positions. But I feel very bad when I think of it, the employees who laid the foundations got very small hike over the years and I feel underpaid now. Also, I was the member who laid the foundation of the team and created the initial reputation which was required.

Salary negotiations based on previous salaries are just plain idiocracy. I have co-workers who are excellent in terms of the skillset and the value they create but they come from either smaller cities where the pay was not great or from startups which didn't pay very well in the early days. These people suffer a lot even though they know that their counterparts who come from large companies and had good salaries get paid almost 1.5-2X.

</comment><comment><USER47> this wont really help much because they will still ask how much do you expect to make and people who have low salaries currently will say a low number that is just slightly higher than their current salary. They need to make it illegal to ask any salary questions prior to the company making an initial offer. I cant even understand why they would not just make it mandatory to reveal the salary range of the position at the beginning of the interview process. No company can make a valid argument for why they cant reveal a salary range to prospective employees other than we can pay them less if they dont know the range.

<comment><USER48> > I cant even understand why they would not just make it mandatory to reveal > the salary range of the position at the beginning of the interview process.

Something of this nature would lead to the 'bait and switch' by companies with shady interview practices. Interview a candidate for a position with a $150k posted salary, then make an offer for a different position that is $100k and the company has deemed a better fit for the skill set.

</comment></comment><comment><USER49> Here's a question I've wondered for a long time -- replies appreciated!:

Is there any legal risk in lying about your current/past salary? I'm not talking ethically. That's a different discussion.

<comment><USER50> I have seen that some employers ask for documentation of past salary. I don't think you will have any legal ramifications. Only they might rescind their offer or later fire you if they find out you lied

</comment></comment><comment><USER51> This is desperately needed in the UK, the recruiters (external) here won't even let you proceed if you don't reveal it.

<comment><USER52> This wasn't my experience. Only a few recruiters asked and when told "no" they didn't ask why or ask again.

Generally you don't want to work for the companies that demand it either.

<comment><USER51> Where are you based? I'm in London and it's gotten so bad for me I only apply direct now so I can ask for a specific number that I would like. I no longer take calls or reply to external recruiters because so far they all tell me they won't proceed unless I tell them my precious salary despite myselr having told them what I want to make in the new role. Even if the company is willing to pay what I want they insist on knowing. I just say thanks but no thanks.

<comment><USER52> London also. I'm not a recent graduate though, and I only do contract roles.

<comment><USER51> I'm experienced/senior too but I usually look for permanents so may be that is the why we have been treated differently.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER53> If asked, say "My previous contract prohibits sharing compensation details [as it probably does], and I take my commitments very seriously."

<comment><USER54> Is that actually a thing that can exist in employment contracts?

Because it would be a great way to shut down anyone asking about your salary.

If it's not then they're going know you're just trying to avoid answering the question.

<comment><USER53> As far as I know it is quite common.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER55> One of my coworkers just got hired by one of the big Silicon Valley companies and he said that the company knew his salary down to the cent without him disclosing it. Does anybody know how they could have found out? Could this be part of the background check?

</comment><comment><USER56> This is good legislation. Hopefully this is legislation that we will no longer need in the future. Good government doesn't always mean smaller government. It gets smaller when it needs to and sometimes larger when it needs to.

</comment><comment><USER57> No one mentions that this isn't officially implemented until 2018. Don't go into interviews expecting this to be law, and definitely use the strategies that other users have pointed out.

</comment><comment><USER58> Any change to the bargaining process will not fix the gender pay gap, as it is no significant factor. There is an excellent Freakonomics episode about it: [http://freakonomics.com/podcast/the-true-story-of-the- gender...](http://freakonomics.com/podcast/the-true-story-of-the-gender-pay- gap-a-new-freakonomics-radio-podcast/)

<comment><USER10> Of course not.

But if feminism can be abused to improve workers' rights in the US, that's good enough, isn't it?

</comment></comment><comment><USER59> What are the chances that in this particular case, enforcing noise in the data actually leads to better economic results?

Technically less information can lead imperfect human reasoners to more rational allocation of resources, but you'd have to do a lot more work to prove that to me than some policymaker's "feeling".

</comment><comment><USER39> > a group of female cafeteria workers who filed a lawsuit in 1991 seeking > parity with male janitors, who did comparable work, the cafeteria workers > said, but were paid significantly more.

You'd have to pay me more to do janitorial work than cafeteria work. Cleaning bathrooms is dangerous, dirty work.

</comment><comment><USER60> By the way, if a new employer asks this, you don't have to answer them. You can politely say "I'd prefer not to share my previous salary with you." If you're at this point in the discussion this isn't likely to hurt your chances of being hired.

</comment><comment><USER61> I'm from MA and I think this is a great piece of legislation.

I'd like to take it a step further and some day see a service where people can submit _verified_ wage data to and access this wage data when they are negotiating employment terms.

My employer uses wage data from a survey they buy for several thousands of dollars when it comes negotiation time. The wage data is reported by other employers and includes wage data from companies across the country. I think it would help level the playing field when it comes to negotiations for anyone that is in that position because as it is now, even with this piece of legislation, employers have the upper hand.

</comment><comment><USER62> I don't like bans but whenever people asked me about my current pay I told them it is confidential and I should be judged based on what you are willing to pay rather than what I am making.

My first job change gave me 2X the salary.

</comment><comment><USER63> I've read a few anecdotes here about fumbling the question. Let me tell you the magic words, "Sorry, that's confidential (it really is), I'm looking for $X."

<comment><USER64> My contract states I'm not allowed to disclose such information. And I'm pretty sure their contract will say the same.

</comment></comment><comment><USER65> I never ask the question, "what did you make", but "what do you want to make". More often specifically preface with, "do not tell me what you make".

</comment><comment><USER66> How weird, I just read a really interesting article about pay disclosure, esp. regarding women's pay: [http://www.wired.com/2015/05/im-terrified-tell-people- much-m...](http://www.wired.com/2015/05/im-terrified-tell-people-much-make/)

I'm a big advocate for salary transparency, but I share that author's struggle - what's the best way to ethically disclose my salary to my coworkers, or publicly?

</comment><comment><USER67> First thought Finally! Jobs are worth what the market bears right then, not what they were previously worth, so why do employers want to ask such demeaning questions Second thought Boy, all of those recruiting/hr programs are going to need to be re-written to comply. A lot require you to say what you've been paid at every previous job. Since they are sold nationally, all of those HR departments will need that one field stripped out to now comply to MA law.

</comment><comment> atom-morgan If an employer asks for your previous salary decline and threaten to walk. It's not that hard. Learning how to handle these situations is an acquired skill. Learn it.

</comment><comment><USER68> I got bit by this at my current job. I didn't remember telling them my salary at my previous company (usually I decline to answer), but my manager brought it up when I was trying to negotiate an extra 5k.

It's unfortunate that I must've told them my base salary when applying online and that I didn't do a proper negotiation afterwards. My new company doesn't give out stocks of any kind, so overall I'm making less.

<comment><USER69> I've run into quite a few applications that won't let you continue past the salary history without entering something. Its definitely a dark pattern for job applications

<comment><USER70> Might be able to get away with an improper input though. 0? 0000000? 999999999999? N/A?

<comment><USER71> Sure but they auto trash apps outside the range 50k to 100k...

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER72> Might this be unconstitutional under the first amendment?

</comment><comment><USER73> It pains me to see that people can't apply common sense without law anymore.

If a potential employer asks about my previous salary, I refuse to answer. Similarly, it never even occured to me to hide my salary from my coworkers regardless of what my employer asked me to do.

Needless to say, if any employer has a problem with that, I definitely don't want to spend 8+ hours of my day with them.

<comment><USER74> Right now, it is an applicant's ballgame, because our skills are highly valued.

What happens if that is no longer the situation?

<comment><USER73> I'll try to keep my response short.

Ideally, everyone should be working for something they actually believe in and everyone should work with people whose skillset is valuable to achieve their common goal.

If there is no mutual respect and at least a minimum level of decency and each party of the employment contract is just chasing their own gains then we end up in this sad situation where laws are needed to lay out and enforce the rules of even basic human interaction.

That's why it pains me to see this.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER75> I love the new law, sad to see it based on a false premise:

[http://www.forbes.com/sites/karinagness/2016/04/12/dont- buy-...](http://www.forbes.com/sites/karinagness/2016/04/12/dont-buy-into-the- gender-pay-gap-myth)

<comment><USER76> I think at most it's an exaggerated premise, not false. There's tons of evidence that it does exist, though there is much debate over what exactly the percentage of the gap is. It's hard to find "the gap doesn't exist at all" evidence outside of certain think tanks or opinion pieces.

</comment></comment><comment><USER77> Would love to hear the opinions of founders who hated this practice as employees now they're on the other side of the table.

Personally I've always had a strict salary/comp band in place for each position, but having never had a company with > 25 people, I wonder at what point that breaks down.

</comment><comment><USER78> At will employment. The company may change the salary at any time. They can just employ them, then immediately seek their salary history, then _alter_ their salary based on it. If a whole lot of companies coordinate to do it together, then the system is bypassed rather easily.

</comment><comment><USER79> I am not sure of the utility of asking the salary question anyway. A credit check which is usually part of the pre-offer paper chase will provide an employer with plenty of info for determining your current burn rate.

<comment><USER80> Interesting, i thought this sort of research was done after the offer, when you are in process of doing the paperwork to get in?

And AFAIK a lot of people don't have any credit history, so this does not sound useful anyway.

</comment></comment><comment><USER80> How common is this question?

Over here in Russia asking how much you make is often considered a taboo, or a bad tone. I've never been or heard about this being asked at the interviews.

<comment><USER71> In the us between 98 and 99% of interviews.

Salary is very taboo w friends and family. But when interviewing it nearly always comes up.

<comment><USER81> Not sure about friends and family. In Europe AFAIK it's not taboo at all and people are completely normal and open about it.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER82> This may have the opposite effect as intended, as men are more likely to apply to a job that has a lower upfront compensation and try to negotiate the price upward.

</comment><comment><USER83> Where does the law sit on recruiters asking that question? Because they're the ones who've loved asking me that one.

I see a loophole forming before my eyes.

</comment><comment><USER84> This is interesting, especially given that many people lie about previous pay in order to get a higher pay. It's an extremely effective strategy.

</comment><comment><USER85> If Hillary wins, you'll also be able to ask about your peers' salary, legally - not sure to what extent of course, probably won't apply if you're asking for a level higher than yours - so that the "glass ceiling" might be broken, meaning women in the same job w/the same quals/experience should make the same as men. My wife found out through a colleague who's a friend of hers as well that he made 10k over her, same experience/qualifications/title....

<comment><USER10> If Obama wins, Guantanamo and CIA blacksites will be shut down.

Oh, wait, presidential candidates' promises aren't worth anything.

</comment></comment><comment><USER86> Does this sort of information get revealed in background checks for previous places of employment or is that a privacy thing?

Also is it really necessary for a state to dictate such things? Is it too much pressure for someone to respectfully decline to answer such a question and practice some negotiation skills? What exactly is the state's interest in this sort of thing precisely?

<comment><USER87> No it doesn't come back in a background check. The only thing that comes back is your title and employment dates.

That is actually how I've avoided all those annoying salary negotiations. Lie about how much I make, let them offer me slightly above that and gladly accept.

</comment></comment><comment><USER88> how would this prevent an external recruiter from asking?

What if the company has an office just over the MA border where they hire then later relocate the employee to MA?

</comment><comment><USER89> Can an employee ask employer's debt details?

</comment><comment><USER90> This law goes in effect in two years?!

</comment><comment><USER90> This law goes in effect in two years!?

</comment><comment><USER91> non compete is far more valuable.

<comment><USER92> I don't disagree, but that doesn't necessarily mean this is a bad idea. The difficult part is enforcement, of course.

</comment></comment><comment><USER93> Good. To be honest asking about previous salary is offensive, and only helps employers take advantage of employees who aren't tactful enough to refuse to answer.

</comment><comment><USER94> Are you a star? If not, then you have very little leverage in negotiating compensation. That is true across professions: Rock Star, Sports Star, Sales Star, Surgical Star, you name it. Next ask if stars are made or born. If born, then you're out of luck again - until you are reincarnate. If made, then learn from how others made themselves stars. Like many things in life, it helps to start young, and it often comes down to luck.

If your plan is not to achieve fame and fortune via stardom, then pursue it through more accessible means like being a doctor or lawyer or banker or businessperson. Being an engineer or scientist can be a stepping-stone, but if you stay on that stone then there is a slim chance of achieving star power.

<comment><USER95> Not all markets are superstar markets. Some places the 100th best worker is about just as good as the best worker, like for janitors.

<comment><USER94> First, I beg to differ your "like for janitors" statement. In almost every profession there is a large difference between the top performers and the average. But your statement "Not all markets are superstar markets" is exactly the point of my post - engineering is not a superstar market, and hence engineers will never have much compensation leverage.</comment></comment></comment>


Psyco, the Python Optimizing Compiler, is under Active Development Again - <AUTHOR> http://codespeak.net/pipermail/pypy-dev/2009q1/005014.html

<comment><USER2> The link is to an announcement that there will be an announcement and an invitation to try it.

If you don't have a clue to what the hell psyco is, here is the intro page: <http://psyco.sourceforge.net/introduction.html>

For those don't want to strain the clicking finger, Psyco is a specializing compiler, sort of a JIT compiler for Python, which can speed up your code 2x to 100x at the cost of lots of memory.</comment>


Install OS X 10.10 Yosemite in VirtualBox - <AUTHOR> http://blog.frd.mn/install-os-x-10-10-yosemite-in-virtualbox/ <comment><USER2> There is a simpler solution out there using Hashicorps' Packer and the great build scripts from timsutton ( can build images for Fusion and Parallels, too.):

[https://github.com/timsutton/osx-vm- templates](https://github.com/timsutton/osx-vm-templates)

e.g.

[https://gist.github.com/rmoriz/37b671afe53c984b2f85](https://gist.github.com/rmoriz/37b671afe53c984b2f85)

</comment><comment><USER3> I used OS X in VMware and Virtualbox (running Xcode) and the experience was awful. Mainly because 3D support is not available and OS X makes a heavy use of graphics acceleration.

OS updates also break the installation.

There are many discussion threads on this topic, like this one [https://communities.vmware.com/thread/466874](https://communities.vmware.com/thread/466874)

<comment><USER4> Same experience here. I usually don't have an Apple computer underhand, but I maintain cross-platform software for which I publish OSX binaries. I wish Apple gave some consideration to this situation, which is less of a problem for other plaforms which can be virtualized properly. After going though hoops running unstable VMs on old versions of VirtualBox, I ended up getting a vaguely stable build process up and running. But it was a pain.

Edit: less aggressive wording

<comment><USER5> "Doesn't Apple have any consideration for this situation?"

They do; buy a Mac.

EDIT: That sounds harsh, but it is their business model. That is the cost of entry to the Apple eco-system. I would argue that the running through hoops was your choice. The obvious choice is to not build for their platform.

<comment><USER6> That's kinda like saying the obvious choice is not to build for Windows, because you have to have Windows to run Windows development tools.

Or not to build for Linux because you have to buy a linux machine.

<comment><USER7> You don't have to buy Microsoft hardware to run Windows development tools

<comment><USER8> But you do need to buy their software (or you did, until very recently), at least their operating system. In this case, Apple only sells their software in combination with hardware.

$500 for a Mac (with a license to all their "free" software) is not terribly far from $200 for Windows 8 Pro.

<comment><USER9> > $500 for a Mac (with a license to all their "free" software) is not terribly > far from $200 for Windows 8 Pro.

Amazon: Windows 8.1 OEM, $89.99

Amazon: Windows 8.1, $99.97

Amazon: Windows 8.1 Pro, $174.99

Windows 8.1 Pro provides no tools you really need for software development[0][1] (although client hyper-v is nice), you can develop on the standard edition of 8.1 just fine.

[0] [https://www.microsoft.com/en- us/windows/enterprise/products-...](https://www.microsoft.com/en- us/windows/enterprise/products-and- technologies/windows-8-1/compare/default.aspx) [1] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_8_editions](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_8_editions)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> Note that if you do this with 10.10, performance will be terrible because of graphics accelerations issues.

From what I understand, 10.9 generally works fine in VMs, but there was a change in the underlying graphics engine in 10.10 that works fine on real hardware but plays merry havoc with VMs.

</comment><comment><USER11> It seems the image must be created on an existing OS X installation. Is a pre- baked image portable to virtualbox running on other host OS:es? (Yes I know, Eula yada yada).

<comment><USER12> I know of some images that are available at The Pirate Bay, but they are only for VMware and also require some kind of patch to the virtualisation software for a reason I do not know.

<comment><USER13> VMware does not (last time I checked) support (U)EFI boot and OSX relies on this, even though it's an extremely dated EFI version from 2006.

Virtual box support EFI-boot fine, so no patches are needed and OSX can be installed from a normal, unhacked ISO-file.

Basically I'd say this is a shortcoming in VMware and I'm surprised it's still there after all these years.

<comment><USER14> "VMware" is the company, not the product. You can run many versions of OS X as a guest on VMware Fusion and VMware ESXi when the "physical system is an Apple-labeled computer." [1] Installation does not require a hacked ISO or other modified installer however the current ESXi instructions do say to install Mountain Lion first in the VM then install Yosemite on top of it.

[1] [http://partnerweb.vmware.com/GOSIG/MacOSX_10_10.html](http://partnerweb.vmware.com/GOSIG/MacOSX_10_10.html)

<comment><USER13> So basically VMware plays fiddle to apple's artificially restrictive licencing, and virtualbox does not then?

If that's so, I'll clearly prefer virtualbox in the future. I like software that respects the user as opposed to software restricting my options.

<comment><USER14> I don't know what VMware's software does or doesn't do but its _documentation_ just reiterates what OS X's EULA says. VirtualBox's documentation does the same thing [1] and goes further to caution "These license restrictions are also enforced on a technical level. Mac OS X verifies whether it is running on Apple hardware, and most DVDs that that come with Apple hardware even check for an exact model. These restrictions are not circumvented by VirtualBox and continue to apply."

BTW, if you're going to count on Oracle (who owns VirtualBox) for supporting software freedom, you're going to have a bad time.

[1] [https://www.virtualbox.org/manual/ch03.html#intro- macosxgues...](https://www.virtualbox.org/manual/ch03.html#intro-macosxguests)

<comment><USER15> In the past, at least, that installation-time check for an exact model was not-very-well hidden in a Perl script on the DVD.

<comment><USER12> Any info on that script? Can't find anything on Google

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> I'm thinking about getting a MBP (have one at work) because the hardware is shiny and OSX is useful/needed for some things (iOS development, Unity development). However I'd much rather run Linux as the base OS. That setup wouldn't violate the EULA. I guess I'll spin up a VB-image on this OSX-MBP and see how it goes :) Useful.

<comment><USER17> I would guess you'll _probably_ get at best mediocre battery life not running OS X as the host OS.

If you happen to have any issues with hardware (that are actually hardware issues) it will also most likely be a lot harder (i.e. more involved) to get support from an Apple Store.

Also, from reading the quoted text about the "virtualisation" clause in the EULA - it may only be "acceptable" (by Apple's terms) to virtualise OS X on top of OS X (emphasis mine):

> to install, use and run up to two (2) additional copies or instances of the > Apple Software within virtual operating system environments on each Mac > Computer you own or control _that is already running the Apple Software_

<comment><USER18> I also understand, that if you bootcamp to get windows/linux that the thunderbolt ports aren't completely compliant... Ie you'll see issues connecting/disconnecting devices after booting (like the wired ethernet).

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> Now I remember why I don't like VirtualBox. There's always some problem when I use it. In this case, I followed the exact instructions. I have a non- functioning trackpad in the guest, which sometimes happens, and sometimes not. In the OS X installer, I also can't select the disk to install to. And when I powered down the VM and powered it up again, I get an error message "Error loading kernel cache (0x9)". That seems to be fixed when you follow the FAQ for "Stuck on boot".

The non-functioning trackpad I can get around, by rebooting until it works. Anybody had the problem where you can't select the target disk in the installer?

Edit: got it. You have to format the disk. In the installer, go to Disk Utility and "erase" the disk. This formats and partitions it.

</comment><comment><USER20> Needless to say, this is a gross EULA violation (clarification: if you do it on non-Apple hardware, that is).

<comment><USER13> Yes. Those legally binding EULAs with the associated EULA-violations we've constantly heard people getting jailed over.

How about you Mac-heads come to terms with Macs being bog standard X86 hardware and OSX being a bog standard X86 OS, and that running a bog standard X86 OS on bog standard X86 hardware is absolutely within everyone's legal right to do?

There's nothing special about your hardware nor OS. Get over it.

In the meantime I will virtualize OSX to get the Mac-specific parts of my build and tests running, and leave everything else on proper Linux.

<comment><USER5> What is "proper" Linux?

<comment><USER21> He's probably one of those guys that thinks OSX is a version of Linux... or BSD...

( _hint_ its Mach with a BSD userland).

<comment><USER22> using both you wouldn't think that Linux works better for one

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> Since Virtual Box supports EFI boot, and since we did not fiddle with the ISO in this process, that means this process will not work on incompatible older Macbooks, right?

</comment><comment><USER24> Can the same technique be used to run Yosemite under KVM?

<comment><USER25> Take a look at [http://www.contrib.andrew.cmu.edu/~somlo/OSXKVM/](http://www.contrib.andrew.cmu.edu/~somlo/OSXKVM/)

I haven't tried it myself, but those instructions should help with running Yosemite on QEMU/KVM

<comment><USER24> Ah thanks for the reminder. I had looked at that page previously when it just covered 10.9. I see that it has been updated with instructions for 10.10. Wonderful.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER26> Would this run faster on a Windows-SDD than on a Mac-mini sloooow HDD?

<comment><USER27> Why don't you replace that Mac Mini HDD with a blazing fast SSD instead?

<comment><USER28> Because you need multiple types of Torx security screwdrivers and have to literally disassemble the thing 100% (including removing the HSF and pulling out multiple tiny ribbon cables) to get the hard drive out; and it completely voids your warranty to do so. And hopefully you made a USB install stick first, since they don't ship with install media anymore.

I'm sure the next iteration of the Mini will go to 32GB/64GB(+$100)/128GB(+$300) M.2 SSD options, all conveniently soldered onto the mainboard as well.

<comment><USER29> > And hopefully you made a USB install stick first, since they don't ship with > install media anymore.

As if anybody actually does that any more? I just bought a new ThinkPad and it didn't even come with a manual, just a little sheet of paper telling me where to find the PDFs.

<comment><USER28> The Zotac ZBOX I just bought came with reinstall media for Windows 8.1.

Which was a good thing, because it shipped from the factory in Korean language mode.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Exposing Resources in Datomic using Linked Data - <AUTHOR> http://blog.pellucid.com/post/95282190715/exposing-resources-in-datomic-using-linked-data

<comment><AUTHOR> Interesting post by @ratansebastian on using some W3C standards to expose data in Datomic, which is a triple store among many other things (triple stores are used to store RDF, a cool web standard)</comment>


Show HN: A project management and CRM tool for homeowners - <AUTHOR> https://zenhomeowner.com/ <comment><AUTHOR> Hi everyone,

My wife and I purchased our first home almost two years ago, and I got tired of managing home projects, contractor contact info, and appliance details via spreadsheets and notes. I eventually decided to build a site to manage all of this for us.

Right now you can: * Manage projects and tasks around the house * Store contact info for plumbers, electricians, landscapers, real estate agents, etc. * Store Brand, model number, warranty info, and more for all your appliances. * Store information about your paint colors so you have everything you need to buy more paint. No more trying to match colors

My next plans for new features are: * Add manuals, photos, PDFs, etc on projects * Text message or email notifications for recurring tasks * Add deadlines for projects * Store electrical circuit diagram * Lawn/garden section to store info on grass, plant care instructions, and garden details

I'd love to hear more about what you think!

<comment><USER2> Looks nice thanks for sharing! Is there a way to export my data? For info I might need for decades I'd want to have my own personal backup of it.</comment></comment>


Why I love math - <AUTHOR> http://www.reddit.com/r/math/comments/eo4e1/respectful_question_you_guys_actually_like_this/c19lh2k <comment><USER2> For any layperson who wants to understand what mathematicians think about math, I cannot recommend _The Mathematical Experience_ highly enough.

It is accessible to a high school student. Yet has insights for a PhD in mathematics. And more than any other book I know, it captures the _experience_ of mathematics. Both good and bad.

I like to say that I went into mathematics for reasons given in that book. And I left it for reasons given in that book.

<comment><USER3> Look like the full text here: [http://books.google.com/books?id=lMdz84dWNnAC&lpg=PP1...](http://books.google.com/books?id=lMdz84dWNnAC&lpg=PP1&dq=The%20Mathematical%20Experience&pg=PP1#v=onepage&q&f=false)

<comment><USER4> Not full text, the book preview is limited.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> The comparison of early maths (algebra in particular) to spelling is spot on. It also reminds me of a somewhat wry observation from one of my mathematics professors: that if we taught spelling and grammar exclusively through crossword puzzles and competitive Scrabble, many fewer people would learn to spell and write grammatically.

The analogy is to teaching algebra through endless, dry repetition of problem solving. Some of you won't get what the big deal is; you're the ones who are good at 'crossword puzzles'.

<comment><USER6> Just curious: what is the better way to teach math? Or is that not obvious?

<comment><USER7> I had a fantastic calculus teacher in high school (Freddie Irani, many thanks if this somehow finds you). He's probably the only math teacher or professor I ever had who made math both fun and intuitive. We had no homework, and regular quizzes.

He taught math by talking about the history of the problems we were trying to solve, and how people went about solving them. It was the concepts that mattered; the equations were secondary. He would put a problem on the board, and ask the class to solve it. He would then give us pieces of the puzzle, until we had enough that we could figure it out ourselves. I found the class participation to be key. With most math classes in college, the instructor works through 3 or 4 problems for a given topic on the board, and the students spend the entire class furiously copying down what he writes. It's pointless. I get that it's driven by the need to cover a lot of material, but I'd rather the class work through two examples then the instructor work through 4. Also, regular quizzes were a key part of Irani's class that made retention much, much easier. Instead of the typical weekly homework, two midterms and a final, I would much prefer weekly quizzes, 3 (or 4) midterms, and a final worth a much smaller chunk of the grade.

Last semester, I took linear algebra. We had weekly assignments that I did with a tutor (bad decision), two midterms, and a final worth 45%. I went into the final with ~40% in the class, crammed for it, and ended up with a mid-60 in the course. It was pointless, and I don't feel like I learned much. I would much prefer the system Irani set up, but he's not a university professor, and he doesn't have a PhD. He taught himself calculus with an inch-thick pocket book he picked up from a second hand store.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Any specialized field becomes obscure to the uninitiated. While it may be possible to use metaphors to give them a glimpse into the field, it's ultimately a false picture. And so, analogies should be used to whet appetites, not attempt to explain expert knowledge.

Feynman on magnetism: "I can't explain that attraction in any of the terms that's familiar to you. For example, if we said that magnets attract as if they were connected by rubber bands, I would be cheating you[...] and if you were curious enough, you would ask me why rubber bands tend to pull back together again and I would end up having to explain that in terms of electrical forces."

<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wMFPe-DwULM>

</comment><comment><USER9> Conrad Wolfram gave a great talk at Ted about how to reform math. He is spot on. I think this is one way Mathematica could really jump to the next level... develop a full on home-school curriculum from age 3 through 12th grade.

Math education today is broken.

UPDATE: Link to talk with some other resources: <http://computerbasedmath.org/>

<comment><USER10> I've used Teaching Textbooks (<http://teachingtextbooks.com/>) for math up to Precalculus. It's a self-paced, rather engaging math program with good word problems. For elementary school, their curriculum has a more interactive program with word problems, quizzes, etc. and in middle school and high school it becomes self-paced lectures with problem set / workbooks. Another good, similar program for high school is k12 which I've heard good things about too. There are some good / new curriculums out there for homeschoolers.

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> Not being forced to rush through everything make it a lot easier for me to learn math.

Thanks to Khan Academy, I now understand trigonometry in a much cooler and intuitive way.

However, I don't know if that mean I am beginning to transcend the mechanics/grammar of mathematics.

<comment><USER12> That, like mastery of music, language and art, takes persistence, time, practice, learning, error and experience - make the most of your time to devote yourself to furthering what you know. The expertise you seek will come to you.

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> Wow. This post is a revelation for me. I have frequently explained to people that have bothered to ask (and probably a few who didn't) that the reason I love programming has a lot to do with my love of language - the elegant syntax, the rules and their exceptions. Despite rigorous math training (I'm an electrical engineering student), until now I had never been able to see it as more than a means to an end. I hated math classes so much, but they allowed me to do interesting things with electricity so I put up with them. On occasion, I have maybe been struck by a part of what this person is referring to, but this puts it together in a way that I had never really understood before.

Thanks.

<comment><USER9> I'm the opposite, I love programming, but dislike languages. I can recall in junior high wondering why these certain rules existed. "This is simply more verbose and doesn't disambiguate anything as far as I can tell." The problem I encountered with natural languages is I rarely could get an answer as to why we have a form for this word. Whereas with programming, I can usually get an answer for almost any question I have about a language.

<comment><USER14> Natural language is evolved (and therefore haphazard and merely "good enough"), whereas programming languages are designed. Natural languages are to programming what biology is to robotics.

<comment><USER9> Agreed. In fact its funny you make that analogy... in that whenever I think about doing some biology I want to use nanotechnology. My brain just has more trouble settling into emergent systems.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> _When studying mathematics, the math major sees pure truth._

Then you take foundation of mathematics, metamathematics and more of that ilk and you are labeled a Platonist. Well, guilty as charged.

</comment><comment><USER16> As I read this, I noticed the similarity between mathematics and programing. In fact, if you substitute the word "mathematics" with "programming," the post sounds like my experience with my computer science degree. Algorithms and programming languages were unnatural at first. I spent most of my formative years fighting with programming languages instead of using them. But after a few years, I moved past the point of fighting algorithms and languages and started using them to actually solve problems.

Writing software doesn't help you discover the laws that govern everything, but it affects people on a much more pragmatic level - software satisfies our curiosity, tells us how to go where we need to go, and affects every aspect of my day-to-day life. And that's not half bad.

</comment><comment><USER17> In the film Matrix you discover an alternative reality and choose to take the red pill. When you are able to think mathematically you discover a new universe and you can choose to take the red pill to evolve, but that universe is only accessible to those that can understand maths.

<comment><USER18> "..can understand mathematics." FTFY

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> Great explanation. The only shortcoming, or maybe not, is that he could have pointed out that the parallel he drew is true for anyone that specializes and transcends towards ideas rather than frets mechanics of a field. I'm much this way about computer science, engineering, economics, finance, etc. The things they teach you in an undergraduate education are just tools in your toolbox, the bread and butter so to speak. It's the ideas are what's important.

</comment><comment><USER20> Obligatory <http://xkcd.com/435/>

<comment><USER21> I actually posted this in the lab an drew a red line bell curve over it that was labelled "usefulness".

<comment><USER22> Honestly, it seems like people on HN so often assess things based on their raw usefulness. It makes sense, given that HN is read by many people who think like engineers, but in another recent thread on /r/math, people are talking about how the reason mathematicians study mathematics is not because it is useful, but because it possesses an inherent beauty/logic/whatever that makes the people who study it want to keep studying it. I'm doubling in math and CS and I have to say that the reason I am studying math is not because of any potential applicability to work I might do in software later in life, but because it has an allure for me that is unmatched by almost anything else.

<comment><USER21> hehe I unoffically doubled in math/chemistry, and I gave up on math because precisely due to its inapplicability, I was competing with people who were learning calculus at age nine. Chemistry was a better choice, because most sane parent do not allow their sixteen year old children to tinker around with carcinogens and explosives.

In retrospect, I should have been a coder. Although all my coding adventures post high-school have basically been autodidactic, I jumped in the deep end and took a high-level undergrad/grad CS class and coded my own web server... I was the only person whose server didn't allow the user to drill through the directory structure and hack the server because at the time I didn't know the posix file functions and actually wrote my own string parser/handler.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> I wonder if anyone here has studied the Trachtenberg Method of Speed Mathematics, or Vedic Mathematics. If anyone here has, I'd like to find out what they thought of the way those methods are taught.

<comment><USER23> I have taught a series of lectures on the Trachtenberg method in high school. It has some cute tricks, but really this is not mathematics, it's arithmetic. Don't waste your time with it. If you're interested in maths, study maths not mental arithmetic. I promise it is much more interesting.

</comment></comment><comment><USER24> I always had trouble in regular math classes until physics. I think it was the type of problem solving I understood and related to

</comment><comment><USER25> Can someone explain why Americans call it "math". If the word is a shortening of Mathematics, shouldn't it be called "maths"?

<comment><USER26> "Mathematics" is a singular noun so shortening it to "maths" just doesn't make sense.

<comment><USER25> For years I've heard the argument that Mathematics should be Maths (being Australian). That's the first time any one has made a sensible argument (to me) for the alternative.

I've never heard anyone call Gymnastics "Gyms". :P

<comment><USER15> Interestingly, in Spanish and French the unambiguously plural terms 'las matemáticas' and 'les mathématiques' are commonly used, so the 's' in 'mathematics' may be of a different kind than that in 'gymnastics' or 'economics'.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> A magnificent explanation.

</comment><comment><USER27> The most important truths of reality cannot be captured by math. Plus, we create truth, and math can only represent what already exists.

<comment><USER3> Tell that to Mr. Boole and his logic + algebra...

<comment><USER27> For instance, logic, math and probability can describe what free will is, but cannot predict the choices made by a free will.

On a grander scheme, how can math describe things like love, goodness and beauty?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER28> Mathematica is a great tool as well. If only they could raise their user base beyond 3%.</comment>


MoneyTree VC Report: Highest First Quarter for Dollars Invested Since 2000 [pdf] - <AUTHOR> https://www.pwcmoneytree.com/NewsFeed/GetNews?Title=Q1%202015%20MoneyTree%20Report%20Press%20Release

<comment><AUTHOR> historical data is available on the moneytree website: [https://www.pwcmoneytree.com/](https://www.pwcmoneytree.com/) [https://www.pwcmoneytree.com/HistoricTrends/CustomQueryHisto...](https://www.pwcmoneytree.com/HistoricTrends/CustomQueryHistoricTrend)

Doesn't look like they've posted the actual report yet though</comment>


All I want for Christmas is my Apple TV - <AUTHOR> http://blog.brightcove.com/en/2012/12/all-i-want-christmas-my-apple-tv

<comment> daniel-cussen I thought Apple would make a projector before a TV, honestly. It just seemed like the Apple thing to do, especially after having a projector for a while.</comment>


Ask HN: How to avoid cloud lock-in? - <AUTHOR> AWS is really great, but I don't want to be locked into a single cloud. I am heavily using the AWS compute resources i.e. EC2 and Lambda.<p>What are you doing to keep your business "cloud-neutral" at the technical level? Are you writing cloud abstraction layers in your code? Writing Terraform for various clouds? Any good ideas, assuming a containerized application? What about portability of your serverless code? <comment><USER2> As long as the business logic remains agnostic, the most essential part is okay (for a lot of projects, at least). You talk only about EC2 and Lambda, so I assume you use a "standard" database and you are not using a proprietary one such as Dynamo. (So you are able to change from AWS RDS PostgreSQL to Heroku PostgreSQL for example.)

Typically, I organize my layers of code as such:

Business Logic, Core < Handlers < Front (HTTP routing, sessions/token stuff, ...).

The dependency can only go from the right to the left, so the BL code never gets touched when I decide to add/replace a handler or a frontend.

When you are on AWS Lambda, you code the Front: a glue between your Handlers and the AWS Lambda platform. So the rest of the project can be updated as-is in an ideal case. When you change your cloud provider, you have to rewrite the Front part again. But the layers underneath will be unchanged.

Of course, this is pure theory. In practice, some cases may require you to break this one-way chain for performance or scalability reasons...

<comment><AUTHOR> > Business Logic, Core < Handlers < Front (HTTP routing, sessions/token stuff, > ...). I use the similar logic. But you have presented it perfectly. In one > of the project we had to use NoSQL database in crunch time situation so had > to go with Dynamo.

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> I wrote a blog post about a simple multi-cloud stack. There are a bunch of vendors who are doing the work in their layer of the stack, so you can use a multi-cloud web host, and a multi-cloud database, and you'll be most of the way there.

I wrote a blog post about how easy it is to get multi-cloud robustness for single page apps here: [https://blog.fauna.com/survive-cloud-vendor-crashes- with-net...](https://blog.fauna.com/survive-cloud-vendor-crashes-with-netlify- and-faunadb)

Of course it becomes more complex as the app becomes more complex. But more and more of the AWS/GCP/Azure services have multi-cloud equivalents, so this architecture only gets easier to implement.

<comment><AUTHOR> True, databases have the most gravity and tedious to migrate when switching to different cloud. Thanks for your suggestions. I will definitely give Netlify and Fauna a try.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> If you avoid all lock-in, you pay for the optionality with feature velocity. It's often far cheaper to go all-in, and then migrate down the road if it becomes strategically viable.

To that end, I don't use things with no equivalent anywhere else (Google's Cloud Spanner), but I also don't avoid things like RDS, load balancers, API Gateway, etc.</comment>