Artificial intelligence (AI) is no longer a futuristic concept; it’s a reality. It's becoming a practical tool for HR teams when strategizing compliance and compensation. For professionals navigating pay transparency laws, shifting employee expectations and tight labor markets, AI offers both opportunities and questions.

• How can AI support more equitable, strategic compensation decisions?
• How do we ensure that automation complements, rather than replaces, human insight?

This post explores how AI is changing compensation practices, with a focus on actionable use cases, ethical considerations and tools that balance innovation with accountability.

Pay equity—compensating employees the same when they perform the same or similar duties while considering legitimate job-related factors—is intended to help close the wage gap that still persists among groups of workers who have been historically underpaid.

While pay equity has been regulated on a federal level for decades through the Equal Pay Act and Title VII of the Civil Rights Act, states are stepping up their attention to the matter with a number of laws in recent years that provide even further protections such as: