Am I Underpaid? How to Check Your Market Rate in 2026

"Am I actually paid enough for what I do?" is one of the most asked questions on career subreddits and in coaching conversations, and for years it has been almost impossible to get an honest answer. Employers kept pay scales secret, colleagues did not talk about salary, and the only signal was Glassdoor with half-anonymous data points.

That is changing. The EU Pay Transparency Directive (2023/970) gives you, as a candidate and employee, a set of rights specifically designed to make that question answerable. Member states had to write it into national law by 7 June 2026. Most missed that deadline, so when the rights reach you depends on the country you work in.

This article explains what changes, how to use your new rights to check whether you earn market rate, and what to do if it turns out you do not.

What does the directive change?

The directive mandates four EU-wide changes that directly affect you:

1. Pay ranges in job ads or before the interview. Employers must communicate the starting salary or pay scale for the role up front. No more "competitive salary" or "negotiable", a concrete range.

2. Employers can no longer ask what you currently earn. Asking about your current or previous salary during a hiring process is prohibited. This breaks the feedback loop where a low starting salary keeps you behind for years.

3. The right to know what colleagues in equal-value work earn. As an employee, you may ask your employer for the average salary paid to people doing the same work or work of equal value, broken down by gender. How this will work in the Netherlands is covered in can you ask what your colleagues earn? Companies with more than 100 employees must report this every 1-3 years.

4. The burden of proof shifts to the employer. If you suspect pay discrimination, the employer must prove the pay difference is objectively justified, not you.

Important: 7 June 2026 was the deadline by which EU member states had to transpose the directive into national law, and only four of the 27 met it. In the Netherlands the bill is before parliament (debates on 7 December 2026 and 11 January 2027) and is expected to take effect in 2027. Until your country's law applies, the rights above are not yet enforceable there. Check the current status with your national labour authority or union for a specific case.

Step 1: actively use your new rights

The law gives you rights, but employers will not volunteer them. Three concrete moments to use them:

• Before you apply: scan the job ad for a pay range. Not there? Ask via a short email before you invest in a CV round. Employers who refuse or stay vague are giving you a signal in itself.
• In the first interview: if HR opens with "what do you currently earn?", respond calmly that you do not engage with that question (once the law applies in your country, the employer may no longer ask it), and turn it around: "what is the pay range for this role?"
• Once inside: ask for the average pay of your category, broken down by gender. Once the law applies, your employer has two months to answer; until then you can put it as a request. Working in the Netherlands? The free letter puts the question on paper for you.

Step 2: triangulate with public data

Your new rights give you internal information. For a real market check, combine it with external sources:

• National statistics offices (CBS in NL, Destatis in DE, INSEE in FR), verified data per sector and education level, no noise
• Sector collective agreements (CAOs). If your sector has one (healthcare, education, IT detachering in NL; metal/IG Metall in DE; convention collective in FR), the scale is simply fixed. Read your band.
• Salary comparison sites (Loonwijzer.nl, Lohnspiegel.de, Salaire-Brut.fr), anonymous user-submitted data, broad but less curated
• Glassdoor / levels.fyi / r/cscareerquestionsEU. Useful for tech, international companies, and seniority comparison (mid vs senior vs staff)
• Recruiter benchmarks. Hays, Robert Half, and Michael Page publish annual salary guides per role and region, free to download

One source is never enough. Three sources converging on the same range is a reliable signal.

Step 3: do an honest market-rate check

Market rate does not mean "the average". It means: appropriate for your role, experience level, sector, region, and the company. A mid-level developer in Amsterdam sits differently from the same role in Groningen. A PM in a fintech scale-up differs from one at a municipal government.

A workable check takes about 15 minutes:

1. Define your role concretely. Not "marketer", but "Growth Marketing Lead, B2B SaaS, 6 years experience, NL"
2. Pull the range from at least three sources in the list above
3. Adjust for your specific situation: region (+/- 5-15%), company size (startup vs corporate can differ 10-20%), specialisation (rare skills + 10-25%), benefits (holiday pay, 13th month, pension contribution, bonus, always compare gross total package including those)
4. Compare to your current gross annual salary including holiday pay. Or, if you have an offer, to the offer

If you sit structurally below the range (>10% gap), you have a substantiated case for a conversation with your manager or a counter-offer at a new employer.

What to do if you are below market rate?

Depends on where you are:

• In current employment: request a meeting with a substantiated proposal, concrete numbers, three sources, your results from the past year. Not "I want more", but "market rate for this role is X-Y, I am at Z, I want to close that gap in two steps".
• With a new offer in hand: this is your strongest negotiation moment. Counter with a specific number, not a range, and tie it to market data. Ask for time to consider; do not counter-offer under pressure.
• Just rejected or no new offer: focus first on the next interview process, that is where your leverage is, not in an internal discussion.

For negotiation scripts and exact phrases that work in NL, BE, DE, FR, and UK, see our separate guide: How to Negotiate Salary: Scripts, Tactics & Counter-Offers.

Run your market-rate check

Aycabtu has a Salary Negotiator that combines the three steps above for you: enter your role, experience, current or offered salary, and country, and get a substantiated market check plus a concrete negotiation recommendation with email template.

The tool uses country-specific benchmarks (NL/BE/DE/FR/UK/US) and accounts for the legal framework per country, including the new transparency rights.

Try the Salary Negotiator

The EU directive is about to give you the information. What you do with it, request a conversation or not, make a counter-offer, decline an offer, is up to you. But for the first time in a long time, you no longer have to guess.