Why Millions of Working Americans Are Not Getting Paid - And What We Can Do About It
Wage Theft on the Rise Across Arkansas
It’s a silent epidemic in Arkansas: wage theft.
“Construction, service industry, manufacturing, you name it and it’s seeping into every type of industry across the nation,” says Ana Aduayo, with the NWA Worker’s Justice Center. “In Arkansas it’s not a crime not to pay workers.”
Ana Aduayo, with the NWA Worker’s Justice Center in Springdale, says when employees are cheated out of their money, business owners — can’t be charged with any crime.
Instead, the employer is only responsible for paying back those earnings.
“In the majority of the cases we see, it’s over a year or two until the worker finally sees a check in their hands,” says Aduayo.
According to Aduayo, the law also makes it hard to accuse employers of non-payment.
“As a right to work state people understand that they can lose their jobs for any reason at any time,” says Aduayo.
While this man–who we’ll call Rick–was an employee of Roll-Off Service, Inc., he faced a tough decision when he didn’t think his pay stubs looked correct.
