Should you list your salary on your resume?

The short answer is no. You shouldn’t list your salary on your resume. For many reasons, including the fact that you are showing your hand way too early.

I know there are still ATS and applications that require you to input your salary as you fill them out. What should you do in this case?

There are two options, you can either skew the truth or you can stop applying. You don’t have to give anyone your salary information if you don’t want to.

Say, you don’t have a choice. You are unemployed and really need to apply to this job. The job prospects in your geographical area for your field are slim. What do you do in this situation?

First, research. What should someone with your background be getting paid? Are you grossly underpaid? If you are, you are going to to want to change your salary expectations to fit the current market. If you were getting paid 50k/year but your skill-set is worth 75k/year. You will want to say that you were being paid 60-65k/year at your last job.

Your current salary is no one’s business unless you choose to disclose it to someone. If you are honest in this case, you will most likely get underpaid by the next employer as well.

Now you are thinking, what happens when they ask for my W2 to do employment verification? That will have the salary. There is a solution to that. You can black out your salary. All they need is some proof that you were employed. Not what your salary was.

Please know that this scenario only talks about applying directly to a company and not working with an external recruiter.