Pay transparency in France
Bill in parliament
The government bill transposing the directive (No. 944, 2025-2026) was adopted by the Council of Ministers and filed in the Senate on 10 September 2026 under the accelerated procedure. It has been referred to the Social Affairs Committee. As of October 2026 no committee or plenary dates were set; the Labour Ministry said Parliament will only examine it in 2027.
Draft · legal review pending, not yet published.
Last checked: 10/11/2026. This overview is not legal advice. Laws change; the linked legal text is what counts.
- In force since
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- Job ads
- No rule yet. There is no pay-in-ad duty today. Under the bill (new Art. L. 5332-2-1 Labour Code), publishing a job ad without a pay range or applicable collective-agreement references would be prohibited. Where there is no ad, the range must be given in writing before or during the interview (new Art. L. 1221-9-1). Per secondary sources, these recruitment rules would apply from publication of the law.
- Asking about previous pay
- No legal ban yet
- Workers' right to information
- Under the bill (Art. L. 1142-7), every employee can learn their own pay level and the average pay by sex for their category; employers must remind staff of this right every year. No such right exists today.
- Pay reporting
- Today, companies with 50+ employees publish the gender equality index (Index de l'égalité professionnelle). The bill replaces it with gender pay-gap indicators, also from 50 employees (lower than the directive's 100). The by-category indicator is declared every three years for firms with 50–249 employees, and gaps above a threshold set by decree trigger negotiation or corrective measures.
- Penalties
- Under the bill, failures can carry a penalty of up to 1% of payroll (2% for a repeat within five years). Breaches of certain information duties carry up to EUR 450 per breach, doubled for a repeat. Sanctioned employers can also be excluded from public contracts for one year.
Not verified: Entry-into-force provisions of the bill were not read in the official text; the timing comes from Lefebvre Dalloz. The current Index penalty (up to 1% of payroll) is stated from general knowledge of Art. L. 1142-10, not re-checked on Légifrance. Parliamentary steps after 8 October 2026 are unknown.
47% of job ads in France state pay
44,000 of 93,209 ads on employer career sites and applicant tracking systems in the last month; 26% for tech-related titles (812 of 3,146). Measured on 11/11/2026 via Active Jobs DB; includes pay read from the ad text.
IT salaries in FranceSources
- Projet de loi n° 944 (2025-2026) – texte déposé · Sénat · 10/09/2026
- Dossier législatif – Transposition de la directive (UE) 2023/970 · Sénat · 08/10/2026
- Le projet de loi sur la transparence salariale : où en est-on ? · Lefebvre Dalloz · 07/10/2026