The New York City carpenters union rallied on Wednesday to put wage-stealing construction contractors on notice.
As part of an annual day of action against tax fraud in the union construction industry, the New York City District Council of Carpenters (NYCDCC) gathered around 1,000 members on the steps of the New York Public Library in Midtown to push a state bill that would help to ensure that in wage theft cases workers can actually collect their stolen wages.
“Today we have an opportunity to fight back and punish these cheating thieving contractors, and that opportunity is by passing another law called the Wage Theft Attachment Act,” Paul Capaurso, NYCDCC president.
For years, in cases where the state Department of Labor investigates unscrupulous bosses for wage theft, they are often able to hide their assets, so that if workers win their cases, neither they, their advocates or even state government can hold the employers accountable. Processes to avoid culpability involve transferring businesses, homes and other properties to others, hiding their assets and closing down their company to open it under a new name.
The Wage Theft Attachment Act, sponsored by state Assemblymember Linda Rosenthal and state Senator Jessica Ramos act is a version of a bill that Ramos and other labor advocates have pushed for several years. The policy would allow judges to freeze an employer’s assets at the beginning of a wage theft case to prevent the numerous evasive moves that can prevent the government from recouping the money.
“It says if they take your money, you take it right back,” said Capaurso.
The bill passed the state Senate at the beginning of the month. It will go before the Assembly Labor Committee, and then the full Assembly.
Wage theft, a persistent problem in the construction industry, accounts for nearly $50 billion in lost wages each year, according to the Economic Policy Institute. In New York state, workers are waiting to be compensated an estimated $79 million in back wages that the state found to be owed between 2017 and 2021.
Though the carpenters framed wage theft as a legislative priority for this session, it wasn’t the only policy that they outlined at the rally against tax evasion.
Matthew Capece, a representative of the United Brotherhood of Carpenters and Joiners of America (UBC), railed against the prominence of workers comp fraud.
NYCDCC’s Political Director Kevin Elkins celebrated the proposed inclusion of a new version of the expired 421-a developer tax break aimed at incentivizing affordable housing construction in the forthcoming state budget. New York’s construction trades unions have been negotiating over the policy for stronger worker standards.
“We are on the verge of resurrecting it with the strongest labor standards that have ever existed for that program. Because of all of you. Is it gonna be perfect? No, the greedy developers have way too much power. But now the elected officials, they’re working with us. They’re listening to us,” Elkins said.
