Seher Khawaja, senior attorney for economic empowerment at Legal Momentum whose organization helped draft the New York City law, said salary transparency "gives existing employees and workers information to better gauge how positions within their workplace are valued and whether they’re being paid fairly.”

It also gives employers a way to avoid liability.

“It puts their feet to the fire to think about how they’re setting pay and to avoid discriminatory practices that were working their way in previously,” Khawaja said.