I don't work for people who don't hire people who say things like that.
but don't feed us a line of bullshit
And I certainly don't work for people who refer to a candidate's concern for confidentiality as a "line of bullshit".
There are plenty of prospective employers who actually respect their candidates. Let's just stick with them and save everyone a whole bunch of time and trouble.
patio11's line is pure wank, and will be recognised as such by anyone worth working for. It's not the denial of the request that's the problem, it's the overly dramatic reason - similar to "what's my greatest flaw? well, I can't stop myself from working long hours for my employer!". Bravura below has better alternatives.
How is aggressively undermining your potential employee's bargaining power a show of respect? The job offer is the single highest point of any worker's negotiating leverage and you seem to feel entitled to control the situation.
"Sorry, that information is covered under my previous job's NDA." is a more direct, less bullshitty version of patio11's suggestion. It's also probably true.
Alternately: "My previous salary has no bearing on this discussion."
I would much prefer your to say "that doesn't matter." It's more honest than trying to invent a reason why I can't tell you, and it's true - it doesn't matter. The question is how much are my services, with my current skill set and experience, worth to you in your unique business. What my skill set of a few years ago was worth to somebody else in a different business is irrelevant. Apples and oranges.
Unless it's verifiably false. Which would be just as bad, and probably worse, than patio11's statement.
(Part of the design of patio11's tactic is that it isn't actually a lie: "I don't think it's polite to talk about stuff that feels like a private issue between my former employer and myself" is, itself, a fact.)
"My previous salary has no bearing on this discussion."
This is little better than saying "no". That's not merely somewhat abrupt and confrontational, but it also doesn't necessarily shut off the conversation. Instead, it could threaten to escalate the conversation. As your questioner, I can respond "but I think it does", or "tell me why you think so", or "yes, I tend to agree, but I have this form that my HR department makes me fill out and I need to put something in this blank". And then you have to keep talking. You don't want to keep talking.
People seem to be misunderstanding how diplomacy works. There's no requirement that a diplomatic answer be a direct answer to the question. Quite the contrary. The goal of the answer, in this case, is (a) to refuse to answer the question; (b) to hint, but absolutely not say out loud, that you understand what the questioner already knows, namely that the question was a deliberate, standard-issue negotiation tactic designed to place you at a disadvantage; (c) to politely refuse to overtly acknowledge point (b); (d) to draw an end to the conversation; (e) to end on a positive note and provide an opening to change the subject.
It sounds like your company misses one of the most important things about hiring - that both parties are supposed to benefit from the arrangement. You don't get "the upper hand" just because you have the job offer. If you lowball someone, and they find out, they're going to move on, and you get to spend your time hiring a replacement.
When I'm hiring, I want to find someone who will stick around a bit. Hiring is hard.
I wasn't using quotes for quoting. What I read for the statement was "we're offering the job, we decide the terms." And that's totally valid. But it's not mutually beneficial and I don't think it's a good way to hire people.
Why should your salary offer depend on what the candidate has previously made?
When I hire people for my consulting company, I consider how much I can bill them out for, and then how much I can pay them based on that. Their salary history is irrelevant to me, and their salary expectations are only important insofar as it's less than or equal to what I can pay (and that they're up to the job).
Obviously, as an employer, I'd rather pay people less than more. But I'm also in a business that requires skilled, independent, smart people, and those are pretty rare. I'd rather pay someone a lot and bill them out for a lot, than not have access to such people.
Asking for salary history strikes me as a sneaky way to ensure that you can pay someone as little as possible, and leads to similarly sneaky and/or dishonest behavior on the part of the candidate, as well.
Could not agree more. My salary isn't indicative of my ability, my experience is. Judge my worth based on my experience and its value to your business and we'll take it from there.
You can decline to say, that's fine, but don't feed us a line of bullshit.