Recently in California wage theft and labor law news:  Another California city adds wage theft ordinance that requires developers to pay all wage theft obligations before receiving permits,  The California Department of Labor is struggling to connect with all the workers for which it has received settlements and back pay, and there is a backlog at California state agencies handling wage theft claims.

As of October 2024, the Oregon Bureau of Labor and Industries (BOLI) is implementing a policy that it can no longer investigate wage theft claims from workers earning more than $53,000 per year (approximately $25.34 per hour). This move is part of an effort to manage a backlog of claims and allocate resources to lower-income workers, who are often more vulnerable to wage theft. BOLI cited resource constraints and increasing workloads as key reasons for establishing this threshold. The agency states the reason for the change is it is struggling with underfunding and reduced staff, stating it has around 150 full time staff members. 

On July 30th, 2024 the Consumer Protection Safety Commission (CPSC) released an order regarding a case involving Amazon.com, Inc (CPSC Docket No.: 21-2). The case centered on the sale of hazardous products through Amazon’s platform. In another court they were found responsible for a drivers accident when a child was hit and seriously injured by a delivery van.

The California Department of Insurance (CDI) released a new report in June of 2024, reviewing seven extreme heat events from 2013 to 2022 to estimate economic costs and health impacts.

As extreme heating events increase in frequency, workers and employers need to consider the best ways to protect themselves from injury and death. Heat stroke, heat exhaustion, syncope, kidney failure and rhabdomyolysis are all possible when a worker is exposed to excessive heat and not given sufficient water, breaks and if working outside shade.

In California, worker’s compensation is generally the exclusive remedy for employees who are injured on the job, meaning they usually cannot sue their employers in a civil trial for workplace injuries. 

However, there are exceptions to the rule, which allow for injured workers to take their case to court.

The Department of Justice (DOJ), the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), and the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) have each released press releases highlighting whistleblower rewards and False Claim Act settlements in August 2024. Read for updates from each agency.

A new report released by Harvard and the University of California San Francisco, titled “Compliance and the Complaint Gap: Labor Standards Violations in the California Service Sector” examined the extent of compliance with labor standards among hourly service sector workers in California. Service industry workers are one of the industries known to have large rates of labor and wage pay violations.

Nearly half of workers surveyed at least one violation of the Fair Labor Standard Act (FLSA), with 2 out of 5 reporting violations where they were required to work off the clock, did not receive overtime pay, did not receive full pay, were paid less than the minimum wage for their work, were not paid all required PTO, or they did not receive all bonuses or tips. 

The FTC announced an investigation into the practice of surveillance pricing, listing concerns about how companies are using personal data to set individualized prices for consumers. The FTC sent 6(b) orders to eight companies to gather information about their data surveillance pricing practices and data collection. 

Surveillance pricing has been making the news as companies move to take old systems, such as paper printed with prices on store shelves, and experiment with new systems such as digital price tags that can be changed multiple times per day.  Online companies are also investigating the ability to charge different customers different prices based on personal information they know about the consumer. 

The IRS Whistleblower Office’s 2023 Annual Report was released on June 24, 2024, highlighting the results over the program over the last federal fiscal year. The report covers from October 1, 2022, to September 30, 2023, and includes an analysis of claims received, processed, and the awards paid to whistleblowers.  

In fiscal year 2023, the IRS paid $88.8 million to whistleblowers on a collection of $338 million from their tips and reports. The percentage of recoveries awarded to whistleblower was 26.3%, a large increase from the 21.9 and 14.7 percent awarded in 2022 and 2021 respectively. 

On January 9th, 2023, Denver passed the Civil Wage Theft Ordinance.  The law has been in effect for over one year, and the city and county of Denver recently released a summary of the results so far. The law makes gives Denver one of the strongest in the U.S., similar in structure to the Private Attorney General Act in California for wage theft.