The newly passed infrastructure package’s goal of creating well-paying jobs with decent benefits hinges on the federal government’s ability to overcome the challenges of 12 years ago—the last time it spent big on public works projects.
President Joe Biden, who is imminently expected to sign the $550 billion measure, will need to coordinate a government-wide effort to pay workers a prevailing wage on contracts financed by the legislation—an issue that plagued roll out of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, which then-Vice President Biden quarterbacked for the Obama administration.
The bipartisan infrastructure bill, Biden’s most significant legislative achievement as president, will require the U.S. Department of Labor to enforce a complex construction wage statute within the federal government as well as among the companies that land contracts to repair roads, rebuild airports, replace lead pipes, and erect broadband towers.
The task for DOL’s Wage and Hour Division will be to ensure that the federal agencies that write the contracts follow the 1931 Davis-Bacon Act, which requires a prevailing wage and fringe benefits for workers on federally funded construction projects. The law guarantees that workers on such projects are paid at least the local pay rates for similar work, as determined by WHD surveys.
The 2009 Recovery Act—the most recent major...
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