Wage theft happens a lot more often than people realize. According to some reports, it actually outpaces any other type of theft you can think of. If you add together all other types of theft that happen in the United States over the course of the year, workers lose more financial assets to wage theft from their own employers. If you just compare wage theft to robberies, for example, it is 100 times greater.
Many people are shocked to learn how common wage theft is, and part of the reason is that it often goes under-reported or even unrecognized. People just don’t understand that their wages are being stolen.
Common examples
To demonstrate how this occurs, take a look at the following common examples of wage theft in California:
- A business owner taking an employee’s tips.
- Owners creating a tip pool and including themselves.
- Paying employees less than the state minimum wage.
- Failing to pay overtime at a higher (time and a half) rate.
- Sending out paychecks that later bounce.
- Not reimbursing employees correctly for work-related expenses.
- Not paying out proper bonuses or commissions.
- Never sending an employee their final paycheck after they quit.
- Illegally reducing an employee’s pay rate for hours that they already worked.
- Not giving employees the correct breaks or paid time off.
Some of these issues are very clear when they happen, such as a paycheck that bounces. But you can see how there are many little ways for corporations to deny pay to their employees. If this has happened to you, you need to know what legal steps to take.