The U.S. Labor Department is sitting on $135 million of leftover emergency funding from the pandemic rescue packages, providing a small lifeline for the agency’s enforcement arms after subagencies saw meager funding increases for fiscal 2022.
The Senate passed a full year $1.5 trillion federal funding bill earlier this month that provided the Labor Department with $13.2 billion in discretionary funding for the current fiscal year, which officially started on Oct. 1. Beneath the topline, most subagencies saw increases of 3% or less.
The relatively paltry increases amid rising inflation have already triggered calls for more funding ahead of the planned release of the White House budget request for next year. The amount appropriated for this year has also raised questions about how the DOL will meet the new oversight demands created by the bipartisan infrastructure law, reverse staff attrition caused by the Trump administration, and achieve the Biden administration’s aggressive enforcement goals.
“We are really happy that we are not stuck in the fiscal year 2021 funding levels. That being said, we would like to see larger investments, and we’re really interested in what comes out when President Biden releases a budget for fiscal year 2023,” said Charlotte Dodge, government affairs manager at the National Employment Law Project. “We’re hoping that when the budget comes...
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