Last month a panel of civic leaders, employers, attorneys and workers participated in a forum discussion titled “Wage Theft – Its Impact on the Local Economy and in the Community”.  The free event, hosted by Rice University’s Center for the Study of Women, Gender and Sexuality and by the Fey y Justica Worker’s Center (formerly the Houston Interfaith Worker Justice Center), was held on the 3rd floor of the Fondren Library at Rice University.  The diverse panel offered different perspectives on how wage theft impacts the local Houston economy, responsible businesses, social  programs, and the community as well as what can be done to eliminate this unethical practice.

Simply put, wage theft is a practice in which employers cheat workers out of wages and benefits owed.  According to Houston’s Down With Wage Theft Campaign:

“Wage theft depresses family income and as a consequence limits spending, lowers business sales, leaves taxes unpaid, public services undermined and economic growth diminished..."  Read more » about Wage Theft Forum at Rice University

El Paso has become the second city in Texas where an employer has been arrested and indicted on charges of wage theft. The Texas Observer reports that El Paso is the only city in the state that has an active wage theft task force. It includes the police and sheriff's departments as well as the County Attorney and District Attorney's offices.

From the Observer:

“It’s huge because we’re finally treating the stealing of someone’s wages the same way we treat someone stealing from Target or Albertsons or [any] store,” says Jed Untereker, an attorney with Paso del Norte Civil Rights Project who represented the employee.

In the second installment of his excellent series on the Texas construction industry, NPR Correspondent Wade Goodwyn highlights the difference between contractors who play by the rules, like Marek Brothers Systems in Houston, and companies that misclassify their employees.  The former is out front with how they do business, and the latter doesn't even want their name used on the radio or in print.

From the report:

At Baylor College of Medicine in Houston, Marek's workers are building the interior for the hospital's newest wing.  Workers ride around on what are called “motorized man lifts”, which allow them to work high in the air, power tools in hand.

Baylor Hospital is the kind of client that hires Marek's companies – an owner that must have its building done to exacting specifications.  But these days that’s unusual, according to Stan Marek.   Read more » about NPR: Texas Contractors Say Playing By The Rules Doesn't Pay

During September of 2010, Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger killed two bills aimed at penalizing employers who commit wage theft in California.  However, he failed to win reelection, and after Governor Jerry Brown took over the post the following January, Brown went on to sign Assembly Bill 469, known as the Wage Theft Protection Act of 2011.

California’s Wage Theft Protection Act (WTPA) has been in effect since January 2012.  It added Section 2810.5 to the labor code which requires employers to provide new employees with specific information in writing at the time they are hired, including the legal name and address of the company who is hiring the new employee, the name and address of the company for whom the employee will perform work, the employee’s rate of pay, and the basis of wage payment Read more » about How To Comply With California Wage Theft Law

As Pat Kiley recently wrote about in his recent series Construction Craftwork as a Career, construction craftwork has seen a decline in Houston and around the country over the last few decades for multiple reasons.  One huge problem is the deterioration of the employer-employee relationship that's been spurred by the growing problem of misclassifcation of workers as independent subcontractors.  Wage theft by unethical employers also makes it very difficult to attract young people into the skilled trades.

On Construction Citizen's recent trip to Washington, I had a chance to sit down with Christine Owens, Executive Director of the National Employment Law Project, to talk about what can realistically be done to fix some of these problems.

“I think any job has the potential to be a good job,” Owens said.   Read more » about Finding Realistic Ways to Rebuild the Middle Class

Workers who helped build the new international terminal at the Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport in Atlanta were finally paid thousands of dollars which they were owed in overtime pay.  In the television report, investigative reporter Richard Belcher of Channel 2 News in Atlanta, Georgia explained that the workers were misclassified as independent contractors instead of employees, and were given a “ten ninety nine” form instead of a W-2 by their employer, Colt’s Drywall Inc.

The injustice came to light when some of the employees informed Jimmy Gibbs, a troubleshooter for the carpenters’ union, that they were not being paid as employees.  Gibbs alerted the US Department of Labor who then discovered that not only were the workers not having taxes withheld from their pay, but they were also working more Read more » about Contractor Pays Wages Owed to Subcontractor’s Employees

We received a link to a Yahoo Finance article from a fan of Construction Citizen.  The article is entitled: Coalition of 'Unlikely Bed Fellows' Continues Growing to Nail Dishonest Employers.

The article describes a “coalition of employers, businesses, associations and labor representatives” which have united to work with state agencies in an effort to enforce California construction laws and regulations so that unscrupulous violators in the construction industry are held accountable. 

The California Professional Association of Specialty Contractors (CALPASC ) started a program to support thousands of businesses who are fighting employers who are misclassifying employees as independent contractors and who are perpetrators of wage theft in the process.

The article quotes Brad Diede, chief executive officer of CALPASC as saying:

"The urgency of this issue cannot be overstated.  The recession has fueled more cheating than ever, and law-abiding, legitimate construction employers and employees go at risk each day these violators succeed."   Read more » about Strange Bedfellows With a Common Goal