Common job application questions and how to answer them

Past your name and resume, the common job application questions are the same handful on almost every form: whether you can work in the country, whether you need a visa sponsored, what you expect to be paid, and when you can start. They are screening questions. Each one can end an application on its own, so each deserves an answer you have thought about once, not one you improvise at midnight on the fortieth form.

This page is informational and US-focused. Immigration and pay rules vary by status and by state, and none of this is legal advice. If your situation is unusual, ask an immigration attorney or your school's international office.

It asks whether you can lawfully work for this employer. Carnegie Mellon's international office advises students to answer yes if they have employment authorization. A student who is eligible and will be applying for authorization, such as practical training, may answer yes but should add supplemental information.^[3]

The application is not where you prove it. That happens after you are hired, on Form I-9, when you show documents for identity and work authorization. USCIS publishes the lists of acceptable documents, and a person who presents one acceptable List A document should not be asked for another.^[1]

This is a different question, and the two words that matter are or in the future. Carnegie Mellon's guidance for F-1 students is to answer yes, because they will require work authorization once their student status ends, and to explain the period they can work without sponsorship.^[3] Colorado State's business career center says the same thing more broadly: everyone should answer this question honestly and completely.^[4]

Can an employer turn you down for a yes? Often, legally, it can. A 2016 technical assistance letter from the Justice Department office that enforces the immigration anti-discrimination law says an employer that asks all applicants whether they will require sponsorship, and refuses to hire those who do, would likely not violate that law. The same letter cautions employers against detailed questions about status, because they can deter people who are protected, such as refugees and asylees.^[2]

So a truthful yes may cost you some applications. A false no risks more, and later. If a form has a comment box, use it to state when your authorization runs to.

Start by finding out what the employer already said. Some states require it. New York's law covers businesses with four or more employees and requires a compensation range in postings for jobs, promotions and transfers.^[6] California requires employers with 15 or more employees to include the pay scale in job postings, and lets any applicant ask for the pay scale of the position.^[5]

If there is no posted range, check public data. The Bureau of Labor Statistics publishes wage estimates every year for about 830 occupations, nationally, by state and by metropolitan area.^[7]

Then, as common advice and not a rule:

• If the field takes text, give a range whose bottom is a number you would accept.
• If it only takes one number, give a figure inside the posted range or near the local median for the role.
• Do not enter 0 or 1 to dodge the field. A person reads it eventually.
• Use the same figures on every form for the same kind of role.

It depends on the state. In California an employer cannot seek salary history information, orally or in writing, personally or through an agent. You may still volunteer it without prompting, and an employer may then consider it.^[5] Other states and some cities have their own rules, and many have none. Look up the labor department page for the state where the job is located.

Where the question is allowed and required, answer it truthfully. Where it is optional, you can leave it empty and let your expectation speak instead.

A date you can keep. If you are employed, count your notice period from the day you would realistically accept an offer, not from today. If you are free now, say so. If a form demands a calendar date weeks before any interview, pick the earliest realistic one. It can be confirmed later, and nobody expects it to be exact.

Write them down once. Tonight, in one document:

Consistency matters because the same employer may see two of your applications, and because a tired person at form forty makes mistakes a rested person would not. Saved details also do the retyping for you: Final Resume's Prefill fills these fields from what you saved and leaves a field empty and marked when your details do not decide it.