All profit is based on exploitation. Surplus value is extracted in absolute and relative terms. Absolute surplus value is increasing the amount of time worked per worker. Relative surplus value is extracted by reducing wages or increasing productivity and intensity.
With that orientation explicitly stated, I work in tech and I find discussing salary extremely difficult. Recruiters and hiring managers ask: "What is your salary expectation?" I have no idea how to respond and because I am desperate for a job, respond with what my friends later tell me is "a low ball". It is a wild wild west, with ignorant HR people looking for buzzwords, unrealistic tech stacks, and a lot of bait and switch.
How to approach salary questions? Should I give them a number first? My neoliberal friends tell me "how much value you think you generate", and I respond "enough so I don't have to work anymore".
I was asked this mid-interview with the hiring manager. Was caught off guard because we were discussing something tangential like taste in books and music, then wham , "what's your salary expectation?" Was caught off guard and lulled into a sense of friendship before feeling I had to give a hard number for the talk to proceed.
Classic HR move right there. They love doing that shit.
Yeah, you think you're connecting with some Boomer based on a mutual love of Sun Ra and then the icy fist of economic calculation appears.
go into every interview, even with engineers, expecting this question to drop at an unexpected time. they stand a lot to gain by making you uncomfortable enough to answer low. whether you should answer a little high or defer to let them set the band is mostly about how confident you feel in your skills / their perception of your skills / your ability to get other offers / your own knowledge of what band they're going to offer you.