Forum Post: Wage theft a growing problem for low-wage workers in the U.S., Florida
Posted 12 years ago on April 22, 2012, 11:19 a.m. EST by GirlFriday
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Wage theft, the practice of stiffing workers out of money they are owed, has emerged as a major economic justice issue in the U.S. over the last decade, to the point where over 60 percent “of low-wage workers experience wage theft each week,” according to a report released Wednesday.
According to the report, released by the Progressive States Network, worker advocacy organizations “revealed a disturbing reality: seventy years after enactment of the nation’s first wage law, the Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938, enforcement capacity has diminished to the point where there are essentially no cops on the beat.”
The report, “Cracking Down on Wage Theft” (.pdf), adds that “a sharp decrease in union membership and an increase in low-wage and informal employment … has led to a significant rise in wage theft, to the point that it is virtually ubiquitous in certain industries,” like the retail and food service industries.
In a phone conference held Wednesday, Tim Judson — the senior policy specialist for workers’ rights at the Progressive States Network who coauthored the report — said Florida vacated the field by eliminating its Department of Labor in 2002. http://floridaindependent.com/75376/wage-theft-report-progressive-states-network
Thanks for shedding light on this, Girl Friday.
Thanks, BW.
Managers start to look at this as a game, how can I get the most work for the least pay, and they are given bonuses to do so.
I've lost money after the work was over
didn't get all my hours counted
In a sense, wage labor is itself theft. Obviously, people view this claim differently, which suggests it's a matter of degree. Some people, although they work for someone else, do enjoy autonomy, a high level of collaboration in the workplace, decent pay and benefits, etc. For those people, they're less inclined to see this as a problem.
There's various cooperative movements throughout the country right now, focused on things like laundry mats, produce and grocery stores, etc. Here's an interesting example:
The Meadowlark Cooperative, a farming community near Agate, Colorado, administers the only private free land program in the United States through democracy. The cooperative provides many social services to its members and employs clean sources of energy, promotes recycling, requires organic practices and is a culturally and religiously diverse and inclusive community[1][2][3]
The community has an unaffiliated non-profit newspaper, the Meadowlark Herald which is published in Elizabeth, Colorado and mails throughout the United States and has an online edition.[4] The newspaper reports that dams, dikes, reservoirs and other major works are being undertaken within the cooperative.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meadowlark_cooperative
Another interesting factoid:
In the United States there are over 29,000 co-operatives employing 2 million people with over $652 billion in annual revenue.[13]
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_cooperative_movement#Co-operatives_today
The employee owned company concept is also very interesting:
Over the years, the NCEO has conducted and reported on research on employee ownership and corporate performance. The research comes to a very definite conclusion: the combination of ownership and participative management is a powerful competitive tool. Neither ownership nor participation alone, however, accomplishes very much. The findings apply most clearly to closely held companies. The relationship between ESOPs and corporate performance in public companies is more ambiguous. Limited research on broad-based equity compensation plans have consistently found positive results. Studies on ESOPs and corporate performance in public companies come to more mixed conclusion.
http://www.nceo.org/articles/research-employee-ownership-corporate-performance
According to The ESOP Association, there are over 11,000 employee owned companies in the US, covering 10 million employees (10% of the private workforce):
http://www.esopassociation.org/media/media_statistics.asp
Here's a couple video's highlighting efforts throughout the country:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gt_ZHUDhKjs
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y6oOaVWHajM
I think these are the sort of things that deserve popular support.
Wage labor is responsible for a great many problems. It was noted as a pivotal point in the destruction of families in places like way old Cuba.
I am aware of the employee owned companies but hadn't seen the video's. Thanks.
Equal pay for all is what destroyed families in Cuba. Because the revolution accomplished equal pay for all by stealing from business owners and exiling them to Miami. Thousands of families have been divided for over 50 years. The Cuban 99% stole everything from the 1% and then the government became the new 1%. Then 50 years later the equal pay system was abandoned.
No. Actually, the move to wage labor destroyed families because the families were split up by way of leaving in order to find work. Way old Cuba.
The revolution brought many things to Cuba. Castro admits that there were all of these great things that they wanted to accomplish and some of them they did and many more that they did not. He has also said that they were initially very idealistic with their relationship with the then Soviet Union because they thought that they would be viewed as equals and he found out that they just wanted a Sugar Plantation. All buffer states or those countries in the ME all realized that they were pawns either for the US or for then Soviet Union (NOW Russia).
One of the many great things that Castro wanted to accomplish was free elections. But somehow that never happened. Because once you become the 1%, why give it up?
It would be funny if it weren't so sad, to see how some on the far left of American politics romanticize the Cuban revolution, never having met a Cuban. Sometimes they show up here in Miami wearing T-shirts with a picture of Che Guevara on them, which is apparently a hip thing to do in some circles. Sometimes I stop those poor, clueless people in the street and warn them that they're glorifying the image of a murderer, in the land of his victims. Usually I say nothing and I just let them run around blissfully ignorant, until some Cuban sets them straight. Cubans are nowhere near as polite about it. Those T-shirt idiots probably often get home from their vacations whining about how rude people in Miami are. Walk around NYC with an Osama Bin Laden T-shirt and see how polite people are to you.
I lived closer to Cuba than the mainland. But, yeah, I hear you. You know what is even better? Listen to a bunch of Battista lovin' clown asses who talk about the good old days. Those good old days when the mafia came in and was running the show and workers weren't paid well and the kids couldn't read, couldn't get health care.Mmmhhmmm, those were good times.
I love this shit.
Batista the Butcher.
I haven't had the pleasure of meeting many 80-year-old Cubans who remember any of that, but the few who I have met don't fit your stereotype. They just miss home. It's their children, and their children's children, who have never met halves of their families, who I typically meet. All in the name of revolution against the 1%. Who won? Nobody other than the revolutionary government. Who lost? Both the 1% and the 99%. I would advise you to talk to somebody in Cuban about it, but that's impossible since they're not allowed to talk to you and they're not allowed to have Internet access. Or leave. Utopia!
Really? Because I never had a problem finding 80 year old Cubans. But, here is a little tip. Batista was known as a Butcher for a reason. He was also backed by the US. It could have been stopped at any time.
At some point in time, people need to get that Latin America, South America and the Caribbean does not exist solely for exploitation.
True. Latin Americans are perfectly capable of exploiting themselves, they don't need us to do it. Chavez has done an amazing job of exploiting Venezuela's oil resources for political gain. (Not the people's gain.) Viva la revolución Bolivariana!
The Cuban revolution solved the 1% problem by just stealing everything of value in the whole country. A lot of Occupiers like to talk about "revolution", but they should think about what a communist revolution against the 1% really is. It's murder in the name of theft.
And this is what it comes down to. Are you pissed that you feel Chavez has exploited the oil or that you didn't get your cut? Or that he would rather sell the oil to China?
These countries are not the US playground.
The Cuban Revolution kicked out the US. Castro is a dictator. All other countries can come and go in Cuba. Which is it that pisses you off more the fact that you can't sell crap, take over the island for a personal resort or the fact that he is still alive?
Haha that's right, you got me. I'm an oil baron!
It does actually piss me off that I can't have a conversation with somebody in Cuba because they're not allowed to talk to us. And it offends me that they're not allowed to have Internet access. Cubans could not even legally own computers until 2008. Yet over 300,000 non-Cubans 'liked' Che Guevara on Facebook because they thought that it made them look trendy and anti-authoritarian.
I knew it. It's the point, silly.
What makes you think that Che Guevara would not have supported internet access? In fact, are you so sure that he would have gotten along with Castro for these many years? He left Cuba for a reason.
He left Cuba to kill more people in the name of communism. But the left-wing kids who wear Che T-shirts either don't know or don't care. They probably think that they're wearing Jim Morrison T-shirts.
He left Cuba to fight imperialism because you nor anyone in the US was going to do a damn thing. He went up against United Fruit.......because you know it's all a playground back there anyway, amiright?
Yeah, it's all about butchering in the name of communism
This is why they wear the t-shirts.
Guevara was Castro's executioner. I'm not surprised to see your take on his career.
http://www.therealcuba.com/MurderedbyChe.htm
http://www.slate.com/articles/arts/culturebox/2004/09/the_cult_of_che.html
[-] 0 points by TechJunkie (2460) from Miami Beach, FL 6 minutes ago Thanks. Watching you defend the Cuban communist firing squads has been a fascinating and somewhat expected experience. ↥like ↧dislike permalink
Your retarded responses were also quite expected.
[-] 1 points by TechJunkie (2460) from Miami Beach, FL 2 minutes ago Wow you're really fascinated with the history of communism. That says something all by itself. While you were doing all of that research, surely you must have discovered that Che was in charge of Cuba's firing squads. There are a lot of sadly misguided kids in the US who would never support the idea of executing political opponents, yet who go around wearing Che T-shirts because it's fashionable. That's offensive to the families of the people killed by those firing squads, who still remember. ↥like ↧dislike permalink
SMH--you are not a chess player. :/ I am fascinated with history.
You are including those that were Batista's torturers. Yes? I mean you do know this, right?
Let's get this straight. The "first wave" of Cuban exiles were supporters of Batista. They were accepted in the US because they were
The Golden Exiles are still obsessed with retrieving land and status in Cuba. The 1.5 and 2nd generation are into making it in the US, the third generation doesn't really give a flip because they have been in the US and listen to music with English and watch tv shows in English and yet still understand and speak Spanish.
There is a book called Latinos: Remaking America and a chapter that was written by Alex Stepick and Carol Stepick called Power and Identity. In this chapter there is a discussion of a book written by Joan Didion called Miami. Miami is about Orlando Bosch Alex is teaching an honors class where the majority of his students are the grandchildren of the Golden Exiles. The kids took the book home and the grandparents read it and the responses were very different. The grandparents considered Bosch a freedom fighter and the grandkids viewed him as a terrorist.
Do you see the different attitudes here?
I have no idea why there are college kids with Che t-shirts. I really don't. I don't know why men have back hair or spandex made a come back.
Thanks. Watching you defend the Cuban communist firing squads has been a fascinating and somewhat expected experience.
[-] -1 points by TechJunkie (2460) from Miami Beach, FL 2 days ago Guevara was Castro's executioner. I'm not surprised to see your take on his career. http://www.therealcuba.com/MurderedbyChe.htm http://www.slate.com/articles/arts/culturebox/2004/09/the_cult_of_che.html But Che was a mainstay of the hardline pro-Soviet faction, and his faction won. Che presided over the Cuban Revolution's first firing squads. He founded Cuba's "labor camp" system—the system that was eventually employed to incarcerate gays, dissidents, and AIDS victims. To get himself killed, and to get a lot of other people killed, was central to Che's imagination. In the famous essay in which he issued his ringing call for "two, three, many Vietnams," he also spoke about martyrdom and managed to compose a number of chilling phrases: "Hatred as an element of struggle; unbending hatred for the enemy, which pushes a human being beyond his natural limitations, making him into an effective, violent, selective, and cold-blooded killing machine. This is what our soldiers must become …"— and so on. He was killed in Bolivia in 1967, leading a guerrilla movement that had failed to enlist a single Bolivian peasant.
No, he wasn't a mainstay of the hard-line pro-Soviet faction. That became a problem. Put your Machiavelli hat on. If you don't know who that is, put your Brzezinski hat on. If you don't know who that is, learn chess.
Che wanted aid from other communist countries because he believed in the ideals, but more importantly, he believed that other countries believed in the same ideals. He firmly believed in autonomy-no intervention. That is not the way that it works.
The piece of information that you are missing is the Soviet-Sino split. This is important because any other communist groups were forced to choose sides. Including those in Cuba. Initially, the Cubans thought that they could remain outside of this and be a part of the negotiation process. This guy, whose name is on the tip of my tongue, was sent to speak with Mao. Mao pretty much said that he thought Castro was a putz and the revolution was inane. So, Castro couldn't figure out if it was because of the individual that went or if that was how Mao really felt. Castro sends Che. Che discussed trade and yes, Mao did feel that, but Che did not become pro-China. He just wasn't anti-China enough. Now, both China and the Soviets are dropping propaganda just like the US did.
One of the declassified documents contains an assessment of Cuba stating that if Castro died in a couple of years there would not be anyone around to hold the people together. His brother could not do it and Che could not do it. The thought then was power would be handed over to a committee. I think that it is an excellent assessment and is also why Castro remained in power for so long.
Che was going to go in and solve problems but when it came down to petty squabbles and politics he takes off. He has a pattern. Which you can see pretty clearly now that he is dead and there has been so many years to look at it. I don't think he had the personality to stay in one place or to deal with the petty BS. At any rate, people in Cuba were pointing fingers at Che and placing blame on him while those around him seemed willing to let him be the fall guy and remained silent in an effort to preserve their own power. I reiterate, he wasn't anti-China enough.
Che didn't just choose to show up in Bolivia. He was asked to come to Bolivia by a group of students that did not want anything to do with the Bolivian Communist Party which was headed by a guy named Mario Monje Molina. There are like six other factions in Bolivia which was a hot mess at the time. The Vice President had just staged a coup with the help of you know who. So, the land was purchased in advance in a very remote area-boondocks. Still boondocks. No, the peasants did not receive him well. However, there were other Bolivians present. I believe that prior to Che's arrival Molina sold the information to the CIA. The CIA sent in Rodriguez who was a Cuban that had come to the US. That is who killed Che.
My assessment is that Che had already figured out that what he wanted was not possible. He may have firmly believed in the ideals of Communism but Communism, like Capitalism, looks pretty on paper-they both have inherent problems. He was not going to be controlled by a foreign interest. I think that he knew that he was going to die. Nassar said that after he spoke with Che (before he went to Africa) that Che was coming to terms with his own death. I suspect that he had already figured out that there was no winning and no way out but he was going to die on his own terms.
Wow you're really fascinated with the history of communism. That says something all by itself.
While you were doing all of that research, surely you must have discovered that Che was in charge of Cuba's firing squads. There are a lot of sadly misguided kids in the US who would never support the idea of executing political opponents, yet who go around wearing Che T-shirts because it's fashionable. That's offensive to the families of the people killed by those firing squads, who still remember.
Makes you wonder which State will be the first to allow the return of the "company store".
Pretty much.
I have never been a victim of this. And Im not sure I know anyone who has. Perhaps getting hours mixed up from time to time qualifies?
Do you need to be a victim before recognizing that it occurs?
Im saying Im in Florida and this is news to me. I asked my girlfriend here if she knew anyone who was getting their hours ripped off, nope. I would have heard some people complaining about this by now, if its 6 out of 10 every single week, right?
Key findings from the study include:
From September 2008 to January 2011 more than $28 million in unpaid wages has been recovered through the U.S. Department of Labor’s Wage and Hour Division, Miami-Dade’s anti-wage theft ordinance and community groups. Florida’s key industries — tourism, retail trade and construction — have the highest numbers of reported wage violations. An average of 3,036 wage violations per year are reported to the Wage and Hour Division in Florida. Despite ample evidence of widespread wage theft among low-income workers, as of December 2011, Florida’s attorneys general have not brought one single civil action to enforce the state’s minimum wage law, enacted in 2004. Since the full implementation of the Miami-Dade County anti-wage theft ordinance in September 2010, the county’s Small Business Development agency has recovered nearly $400,000 in unpaid wages for 313 workers who unlawfully had their wages withheld from them. The Department of Labor recovered just under $16 million in wages for more than 24,000 workers in Miami-Dade, Hillsborough, Broward, Pinellas, Palm Beach and Orange counties.
http://floridaindependent.com/66083/wage-theft-epidemic
You missed all of this? Sometimes, hchc, you have to pay attention to state politics.
[Removed]
Seems like a little bit of sensationalism....
The FL Independent is a good paper, though. They really liked this bit we did: http://www.wmnf.org/news_stories/occupy-tampa-protests-super-pacs-at-tampa-accounting-office
I like the handing over the checks.
Ya, I want to make protesting at that place a regular thing, like at least once a month. I think the repetition would bring more attention. One and done is kind of like "OK, we survived that, now lets back to business"...If we did it constantly, they would have to address it sooner or later.
You should have saved that for one of your threads.
Why don't you post your Tampa activities?
I used to. I used to a ton of promoting for OccupyTampa, but its kind of died off due to a variety of issues.
Well, I wish that you would do it again.
Im going to have to talk to Cooper, Ive sent him various press releases for OccupyTampa, because 3k complaints per year in a 10m workforce is hardly a 6/10 rate. Not saying it isnt happening, just saying its not an epidemic.
Pbbttt. Found another way not to deal with the issues.
Im just saying that if there were 3k complaints in a 10m workforce, that is a .03% complaint rate, or a 99.97 success rate. I think that most people would say that is pretty good rate.
Ive had a couple of people threaten to not pay me, a long time ago.
But, I'm not interested in your personal experience, hon.
Deal with the issue.
I think, from what the article states, that it is being dealt with pretty well. I mean there arent too many gov regulations that can claim a 99.97% success rate, right?
Its about as close to 100% as possible. Im not sure what else to do to solve it better, besides hiring more people to monitor it. But then we have to look into diminishing returns, how many people need to be hired to get it to the full 100%, because the money it costs will ultimately be taken from other programs.
The RISEP study indicates that in Florida there are six Wage and Hour Division investigators, one for every 1.2 million workers. The lack of Wage and Hour Division resources and jurisdiction has created a backlog of cases in the state, according to the report.
Its only going to get worse as our country gets broker and broker. Eventually we are going to have to start prioritizing things, and Im not sure how the public is going to deal with that.
I lived on the Rock. So, this is like a hurricane coming through and a boat load of FEMA coming down and partying hard for the first night and all but one leave the area the next day. So, one person is left to investigate the Keys.
It stands to reason that if the people aren't getting paid then they obviously aren't paying taxes.
How many of those 10M even know, or are informed that there is a place to complain to?
How many are afraid to say anything for fear of being fired?
This is just another reason for much higher union encouragement and participation.
Im all for unions, I think that workers should have a right to organize whenever they want.
You have to be pretty dumb to not know about the labor board. But to not contact them because of fear of being fired is a very real thing.
Exactly.
Fear of government and it's entanglement with business is a very real thing.
The report is likely the tip of an iceberg.
It's not fear about the entanglement of government and business, it is the fear of getting fired by the owner or manager for the affront of demanding your pay. I have seen it a thousand times, It is why I organized my places of work for the union for 20 years. The government (the NLRB) always defended us, the workers. The owners and managers alone harassed, fired and even beat us. Most of the time, my coworkers and I got the union in. But ALL of the time, people lost their jobs and their lives made into a living hell by the owners, and owners alone, in the process. Government entanglement had nothing to do with it.
And I agree: the report doesn't begin to cover it.
I hear what you're saying, but I'm speaking about the general fear and mistrust of government being promulgated in certain forms of media and ideological circles.
It's likely worse in some "good old boy" areas in places like Florida.
I would say this is yet one more thing that unions do......make sure you get paid, for hours worked.
It's a shame so many hate them, but the propaganda against them has been in place for a century
Ah, sorry for having misunderstood.
And if I'm not mistaken, Florida is one if the "right to work" (aka, destroy the union) states.
You might enjoy this:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=imouDc5u3as&feature=relmfu&hd=1
Thanks...I like Roy..........:)
I musta used that "sleeping" line for weeks in here!
You know you and I see eye to eye on unions. No questions.
That "sleepy" song is brilliant. Glad you enjoy his stuff. And glad we share a view about unions, too!
I do have to say that growing up doing construction, I had many friends in unions, and we would always tease them about how slow they work.
You should come and try an auto assembly line of one sort or another.
You don't get a "choice" of how fast to work. You keep up, or you're outta there.
My line ran 435 axles an hour. It was the most productive in the World.
nice, I would enjoy working in a plant like that. I miss the comraderie of construction and stuff like that. Down to earth guys making crude jokes all day.
Ah, 20 years of organizing workers. You haven't been doing a very good job. Union membership has fallen from 16% to 11%. I guess your "message" hasn't resonated with the workers.
You were beaten by your employer? You should have called the police.
Right, I singlehandedly could reverse national policy by organizing the places in which I worked, policy created by your Asshole Republican criminal friends that favored fat cats literally stealing from workers. Alzheimers is what Reagan deserved.
As to calling the police, I did. That doesn't mean that the tactic didn't work to silence many workers. That's why they did it, after all.
Do you really believe yourself? I really feel like I want to help you, and I'm not being a jerk. What the heck happened?
Do you vomit every time you look in the mirror? You should.
60% each week? Are you hitting the crack pipe again?
I have to give you credit for coming up with the craziest stuff I have ever heard. I thought I was pretty well-informed, but this "wage theft" crisis has to be the number 1 issue in the campaign this year (that no one has ever heard of).
We need to stand up and fight the criminals who are taking the paychecks of millions, and millions, of people each week!
By the way, who are these criminals? Is it the unions?
Power To The People!
If it's illegal, then people should report it or just stop working for an illegal employer. If what they are doing is not illegal, then the best way to 'fix' it is to reduce the supply of labor nationwide so wages in all states go up: If you are poor, it's because you want to be or because you're stupid
Where's AG Holder when we need him? He'll resolve this outrageous injustice!