severance theft was Nike’s payment, in 2010, of the entire $1.54 million in unpaid severance owed to 1,450 former workers of the Hugger and Visiontex factories in Honduras, which, prior to their closure, had supplied Nike with university-logo apparel.46 In other, more recent, cases, contributions to correcting severance theft made by brands that are university licensees have served as a crucial catalyst for other buyers to also provide funds to remediate the violation. Other brands that have made such contributions or caused them to be made on their behalf by buying agents or other intermediaries include adidas, Fanatics, Fruit of the Loom, the Dallas Cowboys, Gap, Gildan, Hanes, Levi Strauss, and Tailgate (American Eagle Outfitters).47 In some cases, interventions by the WRC and other labor rights advocates have secured substantial funds from brands for workers owed severance by a former supplier, even when the factory in question had never produced under a university license. For example, in 2013, Jerry Leigh, a maker of Disney-branded apparel, paid nearly $278,000 to make 200 workers whole for unpaid severance owed by its former supplier factory Hawkins Apparel.48 More recently, in January 2020, Gap, Hanes, and American Eagle paid $1.3 million in severance to 500 workers at their former supplier factory in Guatemala, CSA.49 When Brands Resist Accountability for Severance Theft, Justice for Workers Is Delayed and Denied In many cases, however, efforts to secure remedy for severance theft, even where ultimately successful, have involved protracted, multiyear efforts, during which workers continue to be denied funds that should have been paid on the day of their dismissal— and, as a result, fall into debt and destitution. In January 2011, the PT Kizone factory in Indonesia, which had supplied university licensed apparel to adidas and Nike, closed, owing its 2,800 workers $3.3 million in severance. While partial payment to workers was secured by Nike in reasonably short order, via a contribution by its buying agent, most of the severance owed to workers was not paid until more than two years later, and only after adidas, having been challenged in court by a major university over alleged breach of contract and facing a public campaign by college students around the US, reached a settlement with the workers’ union to pay the $1.8 million still outstanding.50 In other cases of mass severance theft, sometimes involving buyers less sensitive to public criticism, remedy remains only partial, or lacking entirely, even a half-decade or more after factories have closed. The PT Jaba Garmindo factory, also in Indonesia, closed in 2015 owing its 4,000 workers more than In many cases, efforts to secure remedy for severance theft, even where ultimately successful, have involved protracted, multiyear efforts, during which workers fell into debt and destitution. WRC yz Fired, Then Robbed zy Page 10