Anchoring effect. You&#x27;re showing your hand in poker before placing bets. You&#x27;ll never get a substantive increase in pay since the recruiter knows what you&#x27;re currently willing to work for and that some small percent increase is still a win for you. Big jumps also usually means moving out of the range of jobs you&#x27;re a &quot;safe&quot; fill for and that makes them view it as a higher risk of not getting paid for the effort trying to place you.<p>If you&#x27;re not well networked and you&#x27;re not enough of a rockstar to have companies approaching you out of the blue, your best bet is to control where that salary anchor is placed. There&#x27;s hardly any way to verify your claim and you&#x27;re almost always better off placing it at a believably higher position. I mean, companies aren&#x27;t going to tell your their actual upper bounds for what they&#x27;ll pay in salary, why should you tell them your actual lower bounds?