Cleveland Adopts Salary History and Transparency Law
On April 28, 2025, the Cleveland, Ohio City Council adopted Ordinance 104-2025, which requires employers with at least 15 employees in Cleveland to include salary ranges in job postings and prohibits inquiring about an applicant’s salary history. The ordinance, which will take effect on October 27, 2025, builds on a nationwide trend of state and municipal laws aimed at pay transparency and salary history inquiries. The ordinance marks a seismic shift for Cleveland employers, which will be prohibited from asking applicants about their current or prior salary, relying solely on an applicant’s salary history to offer employment, or retaliating against an applicant who refuses to disclose salary history. Salary, defined broadly in the ordinance, includes wages, commissions, hourly earnings, other monetary earnings, and benefits. But it excludes objective measures of an applicant’s productivity, such as revenue, sales, and other production measures. The ordinance permits discussing salary e...