On Wednesday, the US Department of Labor and Wage and Hour Division announced new rules under the Fair Labor Standards Act.
The new rule makes it easier for workers to become full-time employees and receive appropriate wages and benefits. Additionally, it rescinds and replaces Trump Administration policies that hurt workers.
“This final rule from the Wage and Hour Division simply restates decades of settled law, and it protects construction workers and high-road employers,” said Douglas J. McCarron, General President of the UBC. “If we want to attract and retain a skilled workforce in the construction industry, we need to stop employee misclassification and the self-defeating race to the bottom.”
Misclassifying employees as independent contractors has become an all-too-common practice in the construction industry. Everyday, our reps across the Regional Council are working to run cheating contractors out of our communities.
The non-payment of wages, overtime, employment-tax evasion, and employer workers’ compensation premium fraud is a business model that makes it easier for law-breaking contractors to underbid law-abiding businesses. The industry has been adopting an alarming fraud scheme that relies on subcontract labor providers to supply labor under illegal conditions to lower labor costs. As a result, up to $1.9 billion of overtime wages are stolen from workers a year. According to a 2022 study by the U.C. Berkeley Labor Center, these low-road employment.
