New Report Released on Wage Theft in Florida

The Research Institute on Social and Economic Policy [RISEP] at Florida International University released a groundbreaking analysis of reported wage theft cases throughout the state of Florida. The report entitled: “Wage Theft: An Economic Drain on Florida. How Millions of Dollars are Stolen from Florida’s Workforce”, estimates that nearly 60-90 million dollars are stolen from Florida’s workforce, impacting communities, law abiding employers and local and state economies.
 
The report comes at a time when the Florida legislature is debating a proposed House and Senate bill to eliminate the Miami-Dade Wage Theft Ordinance. Under this ordinance nearly $400,000 in stolen wages from employees has been collected. The bill also would preempt any other local governments trying to find solutions to local wage theft.

The report finds that many Florida workers fall outside of federal labor laws. For this reason, other enforcement mechanisms such as Miami Dade’s Wage Theft Ordinance are needed to ensure that employees, communities, and local governments will not miss out on millions of dollars of stolen wages and that unscrupulous employers will be penalized for breaking labor laws.

The report in PDF is found at:

http://www.risep-fiu.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/01/Wage-Theft_How-Millions-of-Dollars-are-Stolen-from-Floridas-Workforce_final.docx1.pdf