As much as I would love for companies to do this, I don't think it's really to the benefit of either the company or the applicant. While many companies set abso

As much as I would love for companies to do this, I don't think it's really to the benefit of either the company or the applicant. While many companies set absolute caps on maximum value that a given position can bring, a person filling that position will likely be tens of thousands of dollars below that cap when they're hired. What that means is that there's a ton of wiggle room for both the applicant and the company to negotiate salary. When you list out a salary without giving any thought as to the applicant, I would imagine that you'd a lot of resumes from people who treat job searches like college applications (reach, backup, safety), while also weeding out potential winners with an arbitrary value on the job listing that could easily fluctuate to accommodate people who fit great with the company but need more than market compensation to sign on. That said, I think that a company should be up front about how much they were looking to spend on a new hire when asked. I remember being e-mailed by a family friend who was looking for a developer. I let him know that I was happily employed and that I wasn't interested in leaving unless the price was right. He e-mailed back saying that he didn't want to talk about salary at all until he was convinced that I was a good fit for the company. Sorry, bud, but I'm not putting myself through 3 months of interview hell just to satisfy my curiosity.