
More Workers Are Claiming ‘Wage Theft’ - akg_67
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/09/01/business/more-workers-are-claiming-wage-theft.html?hp&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&version=LedeSum&module=first-column-region&region=top-news&WT.nav=top-news&_r=1
======
doctorpangloss
Other NYTimes coverage puts the obscenity of wage theft in much clearer terms:

> One of the causes of this epidemic of wage theft — which, according to Mr.
> Lafer’s E.P.I. report, involves sums “far greater than the combined total
> stolen in all the bank robberies, gas station robberies, and convenience
> store robberies in the country” — is lax enforcement of the country’s wage
> and hour laws. In 1941, there was one federal inspector for every 11,000
> workers. As of 2008, there was one for every 141,000 workers. “The average
> employer has just a 0.001 percent chance of being investigated in a given
> year,” Mr. Lafer estimates. Because there is so little risk of getting
> caught, one-third of all employers who have been found guilty of violating
> wage and hour laws continue to do it.[0]

Hourly labor laws are ridiculous. And saying that 60 million workers hourly
are harmed significantly understates how awful these laws are.

> According to one multicity study, in a single week, nearly two-thirds of
> low-wage workers had, on average, 15 percent of their pay stolen by their
> employers.

60 million of today's workers will lose wealth that could compound into more
wealth. Then there are the million or so new workers who will join the
workforce at the end of the year. In four decades of poor enforcement, a
hundred million people have been harmed, two-third of them losing 15% of their
paychecks every week that could have compounded over those 40 years into
meaningful life savings.

[http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2014/05/18/the-
republic...](http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2014/05/18/the-republican-
war-on-workers-rights/)

~~~
hessenwolf
Currently working as a risk manager in a multi-mega-monster insurance company.
We do a lot of analyses using the 99.5% value at risk, i.e., the value that
there is only a .5% chance of exceeding. 0.001% is well into the range in
which the risk would just be ignored.

------
pan69
My wife works in a hotel (housekeeping) and she tells me the same thing. Every
week she has to go with great care through her payslip to check if she's been
paid correctly. When they've made a mistake and we contact the hotels finance
department it's like; "Oops, sorry." but my gut feeling is that they do this
on purpose. Imagine, scamming thousands of employees per week on few hours
here and there, must be quite a saving.

~~~
calibraxis
Yes, the less power you have, the more it happens. I see it happen all the
time. The more powerful the people, the less seriously they treat any debt
they owe you.

Of course, debts in the other direction (from the less-powerful to the more-
powerful) are considered sacred.

This is more universal than just the US, and than a specific point in time.

------
akg_67
IMO, any company that asks employees to work more than 40 hours a week and
doesn't pay for those hours is doing 'wage theft'. Classifying employees as
exempt seem to be a common method used by employers.

It surprises me how often on HN startup employees claim to work 70-80 hours
without any complaints. And, startup employers expect more hours without
paying.

~~~
greenyoda
In the U.S., the classification of exempt vs. non-exempt employees is
specified by federal law, so companies can't just make that decision on their
own. Unfortunately, software developers are legally exempted from having to be
paid overtime:

 _" More specifically, the special computer employee exemption applies to
workers who apply systems analysis techniques and procedures to determine
hardware, software, or system functional specifications, or who design,
develop, test or modify computer systems or programs based on user or design
specifications."_[1]

However, if a startup (or any other company) has non-exempt employees such as
clerical workers or cleaning staff, they must be paid overtime if they work
over 40 hours a week.

Of course, if a company wants to pay a software developer for overtime,
they're free to do so. I've never heard of that being done, however.

[1] [http://www.flsa.com/computer.html](http://www.flsa.com/computer.html)

See also:
[http://www.flsa.com/coverage.html](http://www.flsa.com/coverage.html)

~~~
jasonkester
_Of course, if a company wants to pay a software developer for overtime, they
're free to do so. I've never heard of that being done, however._

I'm going to add this to my list of "Harmful Assumptions That Developers
Make".

If you assume that what your company does is normal, it's a small leap to
classify it in your head as fair. From there, you can go your whole career
never expecting something as basic as being paid for every hour you work.

But it doesn't have to be that way. I've personally arranged my work contracts
such that I've been paid for every hour spent working for a company since
around 2001.

You, and everybody else in tech, should do the same. We're not fast food
workers who need to either take what we're given or face having no job. We're
free to pick and choose from the single best market for developer talent that
there has ever been.

~~~
greenyoda
_" I've personally arranged my work contracts such that I've been paid for
every hour spent working for a company since around 2001."_

Just curious if you managed to negotiate this as a regular employee, or do you
work as an independent contractor?

------
x0x0
I don't know what is wrong with the united states. This idea that somehow a
subcontracting relationship should wash the outer shell company clean of the
necessity to comply with the law is just offensive, and if widely accepted, it
renders our laws nearly meaningless.

Also, if you've never seen wage theft, you've never worked in fast food. It
happened all the time to me and my friends in the suburbs.

------
colordrops
I used to watch kung fu flicks where a town of workers wouldn't get their
wages, then the bosses would stomp them down if they let out the slightest
peep. Eventually some hero would show up to fight the bosses and eventually
win back the worker's wages.

I lived in China for nearly nine years, and saw wage theft on a regular basis.
The working class is getting used and abused in the US, and I predicted
several years ago that they would follow in China's footsteps. Looks like that
time has arrived.

------
Padding
> This has spread to multiple industries across many sectors. It’s affected
> not just minimum-wage workers, but also middle-class workers.

I have no idea how much of an issue this is and what the real-world
implications for the individuals are, but if it has become a systematic
phenomenon, then maybe it's worth rethinking the rules?

If it really is as wide-spread as they say, then having everyone play by the
book might result in a redistribution of large amounts of money, thus
impacting inflation .. which I guess is hardly in anyone's interest.

~~~
pjc50
_might result in a redistribution of large amounts of money, thus impacting
inflation .. which I guess is hardly in anyone 's interest_

This is the most plutocratic self-serving thing I've seen on HN today. You're
arguing for the legalisation of wage theft on the basis that it _might_
disrupt prices.

Yes, if you have an economy where all the growth goes to the 1% and the 99%
see no change, that might be good for price stability. But why in God's name
would anyone want to live like that?

~~~
Padding
> You're arguing for the legalisation of wage theft on the basis that it might
> disrupt prices.

No. I'm arguing that we're currently labeling something as "theft", that might
not actually be theft, and that we should thus take a closer look at the
issue.

> if you have an economy where all the growth goes to the 1% and the 99% see
> no change

Yes and no. Growth (and progress) will go to everyone - Obviously, new
technologies will be available to everyone, since there'd be little point in
them if the average consumer couldn't afford them. Actual money however will
only to to the "1%" (or whatever other small fraction).

The idea is that since, in total, those "1%" will spend less of that money on
consumables/personal-indulgences, most of this money will either be taken out
of circulation (and thus damping inflation) or handled by professionals (and
thus put to good use).

> But why in God's name would anyone want to live like that?

(1) Because it makes for a more easily predictable future, resulting in less
headaches.

(2) Because less of the work performed by humanity as a whole will be
squandered on unimportant endeavours.

Like I said, what is the alternative? Give people more money to spend on
things like booze and vacation trips?

~~~
pjc50
_might not actually be theft_

I'm happy to call it fraud instead? Agreeing to pay people for a particular
time and then failing to pay them is, at the very least, breach of contract.
Falsifying records in order to reduce people's pay is definitely fraud.

 _most of this money will either be taken out of circulation_

It doesn't go in a Scrooge McDuck money bin. It goes straight back into
circulation as investments or bank deposits.

 _handled by professionals (and thus put to good use)_

Profoundly elitist. We're taking the money off the poor because they might
otherwise use it to enjoy themselves or even something really unproductive
like feeding their children or receiving medical treatment!

~~~
Padding
> I'm happy to call it fraud instead? [...] at the very least, breach of
> contract

Well, downloading youtube videos is a breach of contract too.

You can try to attach all sorts of alternate labels to this, it doesn't change
the fundamental issue underneath. I'm not questioning how adequate the
semantics of the label are, but rather how adequately our legal framework
captures reality here.

Sometimes reality evolves in ways such that the legal framework around it
needs to be updated/re-evaluated. There's nothing wrong with that, and it's
part of the democratic process.

That's all I'm saying, and I fail to see any formal, moral or legal issue with
this.

> It goes straight back into circulation as investments or bank deposits.

Some of the money in bank deposits effectively is in a "money bin". Meanwhile
investments on the other hand will (at least most of the time) flow through
certain desirable channels that "disposable income" for the most part doesn't.

> Profoundly elitist

Is it? Isn't this the standard economic theory that's being tought to everyone
currently?

> We're taking the money off the poor because they might otherwise use it to
> enjoy themselves

You fail to realize that it's not money that people need/crave but rather
goods and services. Taking away money, in order to ensure a steady supply of
goods and services, improves the situation for everyone.

> or even something really unproductive like feeding their children or
> receiving medical treatment!

Having a growing and healthy workforce is in any society's best interest, and
a large part of its competitive advantage. Which is in part why children are
subsidized by the governement in so many ways. After all, what's point of
money if there's no one to exchange it with?

At the same time though we must figure out how to maintain this growth in a
sustainable fashion - and I doubt that the optimal solution here is to simply
hand people more purchasing power.

\--

You, much like the author of the article, seem to fail to understand that
there's no perfect answer here. This is an issue that needs fixing, and there
seem to generally exist 2 solutions, both of which present a compromise.

While we currently don't have all the data necessary to make that decision,
the article clearly seems to prefer one of those 2 alternatives while
carelessly neglecting the negative impacts of it.

I on the other hand think that it's worthwile, for everyone, to consider the
negative aspects too, before rushing to a conclusion. Do you see anything
wrong with this line of reasoning?

------
charlieflowers
Disgusting, but not surprising. A corporation is a soulless entity with one
goal: maximize profits. That doesn't produce ethical, human-friendly actions.

~~~
gress
Not really - a corporation is a group of people. Sometimes those in control of
it have no goal other than profit maximization, but by no means always.

~~~
Absentinsomniac
Well, often if those running a corporation do not have profit maximization as
their primary goal, they are voted out by investors. Essentially, maximizing
profit becomes the job of the leaders as requested by those invested. There
are some exceptions where corporations are profitable by targeting towards
environmental things, or other causes, but the bottom line of profit is still
there... Especially so with larger corporations.

~~~
wutbrodo
I suspect those downvoting gress don't understand what he's saying at all. His
claim that "sometimes", thos ein charge aren't only thinking about profit
maximization is excluding the case you're describing, where "those in charge"
is some combination of investors and the actual execs (specifically, in your
example, "those in charge" _are_ in favor of profit maximization).

There are a fair few examples in tech where founders have managed to hold on
to a disproportionate amount of control and can much more accurately said to
be fully "in charge", and those are the cases gress is claiming exists.

~~~
gress
Thanks - that is part of what I'm saying. Also, as another point, 'profit
maximization' is predicting the future, and there is a lot of room for
different views of what the future will be.

------
justifier
i have an applicable anecdote: .. in terse

i worked 120hrs in a week, was refused overtime by splitting my duties into
three 40hr positions, did research, went to the DOJ, they sat on it for 9
months, then refused and threatened me, i sent the DOJ lawyer's secretary my
research, she went over his head, and i got the pay due to me

..

i lost a job in nyc, at the time of employment i was 'wearing many hats' which
really just meant i was doing the work of three people: managing five
properties, running a catering service, doing the accounting at four of the
five properties;

i was putting in 14-18 hour days 7 days a week, i was homeless and was just
glad to have something to do instead of sleeping on the F line, also.. making
money

the way the payroll avoided paying me overtime was by splitting my check into
these three different positions, by doing this i could work 90-120 hours a
week, my 'personal best' was 123 but individually each of my personalities
would be working less than 40 hours

the firing was abrupt, ugly and full of calculated politics

i was upset and wanted validation of my hard work so i went to the local
library and looked up NYC wage laws

i found out that forbidding this 'task splitting' tactic is baked right into
the law so i knew i had a case for getting the overtime i felt i deserved,
again, i was homeless so i spent countless hours in the stacks looking over
legal decisions to find precedence

i even covered potential roadblocks along the lines of 'we are unable to find
his old timecards' from my former employer by investigating the law as it
pertains to how long documents on employees must be kept by an employer

confident in my case i went to the DOJ, they appointed me a lawyer, and he
assured me he'd look into it

9 months later and i still have yet to hear anything, i was told it may take
30days to 6 months, and i had moved on emotionally at this point so i was
giving the guy the benefit of the doubt, at 9 months i decided it was time to
do my own follow up, lawyer is unable to remember me or my case and has to
call me back in a week after he finds my old file, explains that he did an
investigation consisting of interviewing the owner of the establishment who
claimed he paid all overtime wages and interviewing random employees who all
said they were paid what was owed them, his conclusion? i was a crazy person,
he told me to stop calling and hung up on me

i called back immediately, i asked if he had looked at my timecards, looked at
payroll, looked at accounting logs, he said that kind of work is only
necessary if other employees state concern as well, hung up on me again

i called back and the phone rang for an hour before i gave up

i called every day for three days, if he answered he'd hear my voice and
immediately hang up on me

i went down to the offices myself but he had gone home for the day, the next
day when i called he threatened to have me arrested if i come to the office
again and then hung up on me

i called back but this time, instead of screaming i was welcomed by a friendly
voice, she explained that she was the lawyer's secretary and asked what i did
that was making him so upset everyday, i explained my situation and that i had
a stack of documents: paystubs, timecards, precedence, verbose and organised
personal logs; that expressly showed i was owed overtime

she told me to come in after the lawyer went home for the day and show her
this folder, i did the next day and she looked stunned at the work i put into
it, she took my research to her boss's boss and three days later i got a check
in the mail signed by my former employee

the amount was for the exact value i had calculated in my logs, down to the
penny

..

the story ends there, but if you wonder why i was fired, read on:

i was interviewing for a position to sell coffee at a major, yet private, cafe
in manhattan, i got the job but in the course of working there for ten days i
was promoted to a managerial position

i was running the main cafe and its four satellites throughout the island,
doing everything from organising shifts to organising private parties, i did
daily accounting at the main hub, and the full books at all the satellites

my quick promotions were the work of an employee whose job i was doing at the
height of my employment, it was the holiday season and he wanted a three week
vacation but was told he was too crucial to leave for so long, i was his plan
out

by putting me in his position, while still expecting me to do the other
positions i was already working, he was able to take his vacation

i am unsure what he thought would happen but when he came back i was kicking
ass, and developing a rapport with the owner.. mind you, i had only been there
ten days prior to taking the reigns so i was still very new to the company,
when the old manager returned i was put into a 'positional limbo', the old
manager led me on with promises of once he settled back in that i would run
the satellites and he would only run the main hub, for three days i would come
to work and do little things around the cafe and office that needed doing but
everyone knew could go ignored, in those days the old manager had hired two
new people into my catering job and my accounting position, again, with
reassurances that i would get my managerial duties back running the satellites

on the third day the owner came in and i greeted him and asked if he'd be
interested in opening a cafe in london because at the time i was interested in
relocating there myself, he said it was the first time he'd thought about it,
and he'd need some time to think about it more, but that he would

the next day i came into work and i was told i was fired, i asked why and the
owner said the old manager 'no longer felt comfortable around me', i was
stunned, just the day before we took our lunch break together.. this would be
the last time i saw him, i told the owner this whole thing felt shitty, he
apologised and explained the old manager had been there for five years and he
had trust his opinion

..

in case there are any lingering thoughts on whether i did make the old manager
uncomfortable stead it being some weird conspiracy that he felt his position
was threatened by my presence or some such: i ordered a book off amazon,
interestingly O'Reilly's 'Learning Perl, 6th Edition', since i was homeless,
and spent all my time there anyway, i had my packages sent to the cafe, the
book had yet to have arrived before my termination so after being fired i
would periodically stop by and stick my head in to see if the book had
arrived, after about three weeks the owner went from being friendly to
thinking i was some insane holder on, weaving lies about 'a book', so that i
could 'have an excuse' to come to the cafe, now i was getting emails from
amazon saying the package had been delivered, i told the owner and he became
furious trying to explain to me that the package was some delusion of mine, i
went to the post office that checked the package in, and they had a signature
from someone who had recieved the package at the cafe, it was the old
manager's signature

i went back to the cafe and explained this and now the owner was threatening
to call the police if i ever came back, i went back to the post office,
explained the situation to them, they sent a representative, on his lunch
break, the same day, and then called me later that day to tell me my package
was waiting for me at the post office

when i went to claim it i was told the guy who went to the cafe to get the
package wanted to personally give it to me, he came out smiling and told me
everything happened as i explained it: first the owner yelled at him about how
i was a crazy former employee, then claimed the package was a figment of my
imagination; but then the postal worker showed him the signature, the owner
then tore the office apart looking for it and concluded something must be off,
that maybe i already had the package and was lying about it, at that point the
old manager came back from his lunch break and the postal worker explained the
situation to him, he denied having it, then the postal worker started
threatening him with legal repercussions because i was claiming i had yet to
have received the package but the post office had the mangager's signature for
it, then the old manager apparently walked over to his filing cabinet, pulled
the bottom drawer all the way out and took my boxed book out of from the
behind all of the files, i am unsure of his fate after that, the postal worker
said he was happy to get out of there and just took the box and left

i bought a plane ticket to london, two weeks in advance to avoid the price
hike, and spent that two weeks up all night learning perl in Yaffa Cafe:
bottomless coffee, open 24hrs, and free wifi

~~~
CGudapati
I hope you are doing fine now.

~~~
justifier
i'm guessing you are referring to the homeless aspect of my well being..

without sounding too much like an a hole: i was fine then too;

this was 8 years ago, i was traveling in france, i ran out of money but had a
return flight, i landed in nyc with 40$ and i had a decision to make: do i
call someone for some help or do i make it work?; i chose to make it work

when i was in india my understanding of poverty shifted dramatically, i even
to this day say that the states are devoid of any poverty

the exploitation of individuals with less in the states seems hinged on flaws
in our general system

i wanted to help both poverty of the world, and those disenchanted and
alienated by the country that let me stay the longest without a visa.. my
birthplace

but, i am really bad at helping other people,

what i am really good at is helping myself

institutionally or bureaucratically offering my services to provide aide often
calls for me to perform tasks for goals that i already think are futile, or
refuse to try new things due to established procedures and participant
seniority and frustrate me to stop trying to help others, and individual help
is time and emotionally consuming, only helps a single individual ignoring
others' suffering, and ultimately feels manipulative

but! if i become homeless, if i am without a place to live and without a cent
to my name, i was confident i could crawl my way out of that caste, what i
found was living in public spaces made sense under certain circumstances, the
first time around i spent 4 months in new york's underbelly, then a year later
i came back for another 4 because i knew how to play the game.. and i could
play it really well

one thing i learned in my time living on the streets of many cities around the
world, and meeting and living alongside many people doing the same was that
homelessness is a choice

i know this is an unpopular sentiment.. the best of the worst rationalisations
these days seems to be 'mental illness', people without a clue love to say
'homelessness is a mental illness issue', somehow people have convinced
themselves that there is compassion in undermining other peoples' choices

now, to say 'it is a choice' is a pithy simplification of a vastly complex
idea: we need to determine what are bad choices both for individuals and for
our collective happiness and comfort, and how to interact with people making
those bad choices

we need to determine why the choice is being made, honestly a lot of the
people i got to know or chose to avoid were just doing what they wanted to be
doing and either our dominant society rejected them or they saw it as
abhorrent and opted out of it: i need to do your work for you for a pittance
of your benefiting off of said work in order to pay a monthly fee for a
stronger box with a lock on it so i can collect things in it free of constant
fear of it being taken from me when my guard is down? i think i'll just accept
the consequences of living without employment then, those seem more manageable
to me;

but i love being able to have a shower, it is really difficult to enjoy the
rain when you are without a shower and dry clothes to go home to and i love to
enjoy the rain

so that became my baseline: getting people jobs they already knew they were
uninterested in having is ridiculous, but creating a culture where anyone can
take a warm shower and get warm clothes when they are needed, now that is
something.. so i dedicate my free time to dreaming up my favourite way to
achieve this

o, and food, everyone needs food food should be free.. "When can I go into the
supermarket and buy what I need with my good looks?"(i) food will be free in
the future

(i)
[http://www.poetryarchive.org/poem/america](http://www.poetryarchive.org/poem/america)

------
forkandwait
When I worked in construction and restaurants, I saw people agree to work off
the books (at the restaurants) and the construction companies would "bank" the
overtime hours so they didn't have to pay time and a half, even though they
were union companies. Scumbags both, plain and simple...

------
mixmastamyk
I'm left wondering how this missing overtime pay continue past the first short
paycheck? I'd stop working overtime until it arrived.

~~~
pjc50
So you'd be fired.

~~~
mixmastamyk
Unlikely that would be needed, but its a two-way contract, if either side
doesn't meet their obligations, it can be canceled.

------
higherpurpose
Certainly was with the Apple-Google deal, if we need a more relevant tech-
related case.

------
afafsd
Yeah, I know how they feel. I worked in the US for several years and something
like a tenth of my salary was stolen by something called "Social Security".

Do I ever see any of that money again? Nope! Only if I work in the US for ten
years do I have any hope of getting some money out of the Social Security
system (if it's still going in its present form when I retire, which I doubt).

------
afafsd
Before people get too worked up about this they should consider it from the
other point of view.

If you're going to get strict about getting paid for every hour you work,
you'd better believe I, as your employer, am going to start getting strict
about making sure you're _really_ working for every minute of those hours. No
goofing off, no idle chit-chat, just work.

How many of us would be willing to be held up to this standard? I sure as hell
wouldn't.

~~~
watwut
First of all, low level low pay employees are held up that standard you cite.
They do not get breaks and other similar perks.

Second, I would much rather work 40 hours with very little chit-chat then
mandatory 60 hours with 30 hours that time being wasted. I actually worked in
such environment and liked it. I would note that it was team culture, not
something enforced by a set of punishments.

