People stand on the steps of the U.S. Supreme Court on February 11, 2022.
It’s another year, and another chance for the US Supreme Court to further undermine workers’ rights.
In a case that will be heard this week, Viking River Cruises, Inc. v. Moriana, the Court is deciding whether to gut the California Private Attorneys General Act (PAGA), a law passed in 2003. Instead of a traditional lawsuit where an employee might sue their employer over a personal injury, PAGA allows employees to sue over any breach of the California Labor Code—essentially allowing them to stand in the shoes of state government to enforce the state’s labor law. If the plaintiff wins, the state keeps 75 percent of civil penalties assessed by the Court, while the plaintiff keeps 25 percent plus attorney’s fees. In 2019, that added up to $88 million in PAGA penalties collected by the state.
With limited staffing in state agencies, these private enforcement actions and companies’ desire to avoid new lawsuits have “helped to shift California’s corporate culture toward compliance,” according to an analysis by the UCLA Labor Center.
A sign of PAGA’s effectiveness is the list of national business organizations, from the U.S. Chamber of Commerce to the National Retail Federation to Uber, all submitting amicus briefs asking the Court to eviscerate the law. With multiple states debating enacting their own versions of PAGA, business lobbies obviously want to kill the law before it spreads.
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