19/04/2021
Catholic group finds wage theft in US construction industry - UCA News
Workers balance on scaffolding at a construction site in Beijing on April 14. (Photo: Noel Celis/AFP)
A report released April 14 by the Catholic Labor Network reveals that wage theft is rampant in
the construction industry in the District of Columbia in the United States.
The report, The Underground Economy and Wage Theft in Washington D.C.'s Commercial
Construction Sector, found that workers are misclassified as independent contractors or paid
in cash off the books, denying the public necessary tax revenues and denying workers the
protection of wage and hour laws.
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The Catholic Labor Network report focused solely on private construction projects in
Washington -- not in its Maryland or Virginia suburbs -- with a value of at least $25 million.
While this has long been the case in single-family residential construction and renovation,
today this form of workplace fraud has penetrated the largest commercial construction sites in
the District of Columbia, the report said.
Prior to the report's issuance, Clayton Sinyai, executive director of the Catholic Labor Network,
told Catholic News Service that one surprise to him was the extent to which labor brokers and
subcontractors had worked their way into the construction business.
Ten years ago I would have told you this kind of thing couldn't have happened in electrical and
plumbing because they were licensed trades, Sinyai said, but the report found a significant
minority of each trade are now being subcontracted.
The primary beneficiary is the dishonest contractor who's paying their
employees this way
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