Unscrupulous employers steal more money from workers every year than the amount of money lost due to shoplifting. Wage theft is any instance where an employer fails to pay their worker wages owed for work performed. Every year, wage theft results in billions of dollars of losses to the national economy and wreaks havoc in the lives of millions of workers. In order to halt widespread losses to the economy and to align the state of New Jersey with neighboring states, the New Jersey legislature recently strengthened the state’s wage-and-hour and wage payment laws by passing  bill S1790/A-2903 (the “Act”).

The Act created one of the most expansive wage theft laws in the United States by expressly prohibiting retaliation against workers who speak up regarding an alleged wage theft violation, increasing financial penalties for violations, extending the statute of limitations to six years, and broadening the joint employer analysis to include franchises and labor contractors. As a result, New Jersey attorneys have new tools to use in pursuing justice on behalf of workers claiming unpaid wages. For nearly a decade, worker centers like New Labor, the Laundry Workers Center, and Make the Road New Jersey championed efforts to update New Jersey’s law to respond to an increasing epidemic of wage theft. We urge New Jersey lawyers to utilize creatively the Act’s new provisions, particularly in pursuing collective justice for groups of workers facing similar issues with the same employer. At Make the Road New Jersey’s organizing hubs in Passaic, Elizabeth, and Perth Amboy, workers regularly report wage theft because it affects their daily ability to make ends meet. Attorneys from the private bar, in government, and nonprofits, are needed to engage in enforcement actions to end these too-widespread practices as the new law intends.

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