Overtime Pay Theft is a Global Crisis

  

  

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By some estimates, employers in the United States steal 19 Billion in unpaid overtime per year from workers.    The federal government does not have the resources to protect workers from rampant wage theft.  Likewsise, accross the Atlantic, an article today reports that "unpaid overtime soars to extreme levels."  The article says that over 900,000 people in the United Kingdom worked "extreme" levels of unpaid overtime in 2009.  Single women are exploited the most with an average of 7 hours of unpaid ovetime per week. 

Employers are not paying overtime because they know they can get away with it. The federal government's Department of Labor is supposed to enforce the overtime laws, but the Department is a typical dysfunctional government office.  The Bush administration neglected the department and it will take years to recover.  Workers in America cannot rely on the government to protect them from wage theft.  If you call the U.S. Department of labor, you will get voicemail and leave a messsage that will not be returned.  There is a story about a caller reporting child labor abuse with kids being forced to use circular saws in a meatpacking plant during school hours - the call was not returned.  Forget the government.  

Since the government cannot stop overtime pay abuses, what is the alterntive?  The only real option that remains are private overtime pay suits.   Sadly there are not enough law firms that do this kind of work - but that is changing.  Law firms can efficiently represent large groups of workers in class action cases.  This is one of the best ways to protect workers from overtime pay theft.  We just opened an office in San Francisco to focus on overtime pay cases and our office in New York City is regularly filing these cases.  See our New York blog for more on overtime pay.