por Mark Carney
Pro labor rights organizations protest at SF City Hall. (PHOTO BY MARK CARNEY)
Seeking to end the problem of wage theft, many progressive San Francisco organizations held a rally on Thursday, Nov. 18, on the steps of City Hall. The event, part of the “National Day of Action Against Wage Theft”, took place in cities across the U.S., and was intended to draw attention to an issue that affects many low-income U.S. workers, and particularly immigrants.
The participating groups, which included Young Workers United, the Chinese Progressive Association, La Raza Centro Legal, the Filipino Community center, and Pride at Work, is urging greater enforcement of labor laws, and the creation of a citywide Low-Wage Worker’s Bill of Rights. Appearing in support of this proposal, Supervisor David Campos said, “It is a San Francisco value that the rights of workers are protected.”
In San Francisco itself, most wage theft victimizes immigrant workers, according to many of the speakers. Even though San Francisco has an hourly minimum wage of $9.92, many workers receive a lower wage—sometimes as little as $5. “Immigrant workers don’t receive the minimum wage, or overtime, or get rest periods. Sometimes, after working all day, they don’t get paid at all,” said Renee Saucedo, of La Raza Centro Legal Day Laborer Program.
The Chinese Progressive Association (CPA), an organization that advocates for the rights of Chinese-American laborers, recently completed a thorough study on the working conditions of Chinatown restaurant workers. Minimum wage violations and lack of overtime pay are so common, according to Alex Tom, executive director of the CPA, that “eight million dollars in wages have been lost. Workers who try to obtain their rightful wages are sometimes fi red, or have their schedules changed, as retaliation.” And, as in many immigrant communities, fear of their employer often prevents them from ever taking action. “Some of them, after winning their claim for back-wages, are afraid to pick up their checks. The checks just sit there,” he added.
Whereas most Chinese immigrants work in restaurants or in the garment factories in the Bayview, Chinatown, or SOMA (South of Market) neighborhoods, Latino immigrants work in a wider range of industries: Males often work in restaurants or as construction day laborers, while females work in restaurants or as domestic workers. Although the typical hourly wage for a day laborer is $15, those who wait on the street, or outside building supply stores, usually make between $8 and 12 per hour, according to Renee Saucedo, of La Raza Centro. Saucedo, who runs a program at La Raza that guarantees participants $15 per hour, said that “day laborers who look for work on the street do not always receive the agreed-upon wages at the end of the day…sometimes they aren’t even paid.”
Domestic workers, too, have problems obtaining their wages, and because they work inside their employer’s house, they can even be subject to sexual harassment. “When they ask for the wages they have earned, they are threatened with the loss of their job, or even with deportation,” Saucedo noted.
