California workers trying to hold their bosses to account for unpaid wages are waiting years just to get a hearing before the state watchdog agency tasked with investigating their cases, according to new data obtained by KQED that shows a system plagued by unprecedented delays.
The wait times at the state Labor Commissioner’s Office especially hurt low-income Californians who’ve been victims of wage theft, and they allow unscrupulous employers to keep cheating workers, advocates say.
The delays for handling claims generally filed by individuals ballooned during the pandemic. But for years before that, the agency struggled with understaffing and was failing to meet its statutory requirement for timely hearings.
The California Labor Commissioner’s Office is responsible for enforcing minimum wage, overtime pay and other labor laws. By law, it must hold a hearing within 120 days after a wage complaint is filed, unless the employer settles sooner. But the average wait time statewide is nearly seven times that long – more than two years, agency figures show.
“This almost encourages employers to continue exploiting,” said Veronica Chavez, who directs the workers’ rights legal practice at the nonprofit Centro Legal de la Raza in Oakland. “The chances of there being repercussions seem to be very far down the line.”
In 2015, California workers waited 220 days on average for a hearing. That figure had nearly doubled to 417 days by 2019, and jumped again to an estimated 812 days as...
'He stalked me, but I was the one arrested' Jodie Morrow had just finished an early shift at her cafe job in December 2020 when she noticed missed calls from the police on her phone. She knew this...