DOL Under Biden Touts $1 Billion Recovery in Wages, Damages (1)

The US Department of Labor’s Wage and Hour Division has collected more than $1 billion in back wages and damages for 615,000 workers since President Joe Biden took office, the agency said Tuesday.

Acting Labor Secretary Julie Su and Wage and Hour Administrator Jessica Looman made the announcement during a tour of an International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers’ local in Nanticoke, Pa.

“We don’t want a ‘what’s the harm in trying’ philosophy when it comes to not paying workers’ wages,” Su said during a roundtable event at the training center.

The number stems from investigations concluded by the division from Jan. 20, 2021, through Sept. 30, 2024.

“We are dedicated to protecting and enhancing the welfare of the nation’s workforce with a focus on underserved and often vulnerable workers,” said Looman. “The money we recover from employers helps workers pay for housing, childcare, and other necessities.”

However the agency remains “concerned by the wage theft we have uncovered and the harm it causes for hard-working people across the nation,” she added.

During a roundtable discussion with unions and workers on Tuesday, Su and Looman emphasized that the wage division was focused on assessing damages as part of its enforcement in order to discourage employers from breaking the law.

The billion dollar figurealso represents how “we make sure that employers that are cheating with workers feel the pain of having done that,” Su said.

The milestone enforcement number comes as the agency is struggling to retain investigative field staff, an issue that has plagued the wage division for several years. The agency currently has roughly 650 investigators on board, according to Looman, the lowest number on record since at least 2007.

In an interview with Bloomberg Law, Looman said the low numbers are largely due to the agency being flat funded, but added that the DOL was targeting its enforcement at the most impactful cases.

“We put all of our hiring resources into our enforcement staff,” Looman added.