What is wage theft? Wage theft occurs when an employer fails to give its workers their legally or contractually promised wages for all hours worked.
Common forms of wage theft include:
- Minimum Wage violations: Not receiving the federal minimum wage or, if you live in a state like Ohio where the state minimum wage is higher than the federal minimum wage, the state minimum wage.
- Overtime violations: Not receiving one and a half times your hourly base rate for every hour worked after forty hours in a workweek.
- Paycheck violations: Not receiving your paycheck at all, not receiving your paycheck on time, or receiving illegal deductions from your paycheck.
- Hours Worked violations: Not receiving pay for all hours worked, regardless of whether that time worked fits within your “scheduled hours.”
- On-Call Work violations: Not receiving pay when you are waiting to be called into work and where you must respond and/or report within a quick period of time if you are called into work.
- Tip violations: Illegal tip deductions or forced sharing of tips with non-tipped employees.
- Piece Rate violations: Not receiving the minimum wage for all hours worked or miscalculating the appropriate piece rate applied to an employees total wages earned.
- Commission violations: Not receiving proper commissions based upon an agreed upon scale or formula.
- Employee Misclassification violations: Classifying a worker as an “independent contractor” who should be categorized as an “employee” and thereby avoiding requirements to withhold taxes, provide certain workplace protections and benefits, and report for state and federal unemployment insurance and state-sponsored workers’ compensation.
- Prevailing Wage violations: Not paying the prevailing wage for a specific job duty or misclassifying a worker’s job title on a site where a prevailing wage has been implemented.
Wage theft is an epidemic. Ohio ranked second in the nation in the share of low-wage workers reporting wages below minimum wage, costing Ohio employees $600 million per year. The Ohio Attorney General office has estimated that more than 900,000 Ohio workers are misclassified annually, costing Ohio about $790 million in lost unemployment compensation payments, workers’ compensation premiums, and state income taxes.
Stealing wages from workers is never a good business model. The Central Ohio Worker Center is here to support you on your quest to recover wages and fight back against wage theft.
Have you experienced wage theft?
We can help! We have trained intake volunteers, knowledgable staff, and can help you through the process.
Who is affected by wage theft?
An estimated fifteen billion dollars is stolen from workers nationwide each year. Most of that money is stolen from low income workers who are most dependent on the timely payment of their wages to survive and who face difficult choices and challenges when they speak out against their employers.
Just by failure of employers to pay the minimum wage, an estimated 217,000 Ohioans suffer from wage theft each year. Yet minimum wage is only one type of wage theft. Imagine how many Ohioans are affected by all the different kinds of wage theft each and every day. This is money stolen from hard working employees throughout our state, and it most often affects individuals who are low income and most affects women and minorities.
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What laws protect people from wage theft?
Both federal and state laws provide protections to workers regarding wages and employment conditions. The Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) establishes federal minimum wage, overtime pay eligibility, recordkeeping rules, and child labor standards affecting both full-time and part-time workers. The FLSA also provides certain exemptions, where job duties and classifications can exempt a worker from protection under FLSA laws. The Ohio Wage Acts and Ohio Constitution also provide workers certain limited protections.
Wage theft can be enforced by the United States Department of Labor, state departments of labor or commerce, or by private attorneys who litigate cases on behalf of individuals or groups of workers. There are three district offices of the United States Department of Labor located in Ohio. The state of Ohio only employs six wage and hour agents to monitor labor practices, despite the fact that Ohio has over 5.5 million workers. The budget for those six agents and the department that monitors labor practices continues to shrink with every Ohio budget cycle and the state legislature has made no indication that they plan to change that decline. Wage theft persists in Ohio because enforcement is not strong enough.
In 2020, Columbus passed a wage enforcement ordinance that directed the city to take all possible action to prevent wage theft. Not only will this strengthen the oversight of city-incentivized projects, but it shows that the City of Columbus intends to and does in fact support policies that work for both workers and law-abiding businesses.
What can I do if I suspect I have been the victim of wage theft?
Consult a wage theft intake volunteer to determine your next steps. The Central Ohio Worker Center is here to support you and get you answers to all your questions. The Central Ohio Worker Center has a network of coalition partners, attorneys, and volunteers who can assist with evaluating your case and taking well-informed next steps to recover the money you are owed and fight to stop your employer from stealing from you and your co-workers in the future.
The Central Ohio Worker Center hosts wage theft clinics the first Saturday of every month. In addition, wage theft intake volunteers are available throughout the month to talk via telephone or in-person. If you are interested in speaking with a volunteer or becoming a volunteer, please contact centralohioworkercenter@gmail.com or click CONTACT US on the left of this page for more information.
How can I help fight wage theft?
Help us in the fight for justice! Donate to the Central Ohio Worker Center today and help us sustain our work in the community. Your tax deductible donation can be used for wage theft flyer and canvassing outreach, materials for the wage theft clinic, stamps, paper, ink, education materials, program materials, legal fees for low income workers, and more!