PHILADELPHIA ‒ The U.S. Department of Labor has entered into an agreement with Perdue Farms Inc. and secured a separate agreement with temporary staffing agency Staff Management Solutions LLC and SMX LLC, collectively referred to as “SMX,” to address child labor violations found in an investigation of Perdue’s poultry processing facility in Accomac, Virginia. 

CHICAGO ‒ The U.S. Department of Labor has entered into an agreement with JBS USA Food Co. in which the nation’s leading meat packing processor and slaughterhouse will provide $4 million to assist individuals and communities affected by unlawful child labor practices nationwide.

The Jan. 13, 2025, agreement commits JBS to holding key elements of its supply chain, third-party contractors and service providers accountable for illegal child labor. They are also creating a targeted advertising campaign to raise awareness about unlawful child labor practices.

HARTFORD, CT – The U.S. Department of Labor has reached an administrative settlement with Rhode Island’s second largest hospital and Care New England Health System to recover a total of $1.9 million in back wages and liquidated damages for 853 healthcare workers who had to work through their breaks but were not paid properly for those hours worked during the COVID-19 pandemic. 

WASHINGTON – The U.S. Department of Labor today announced a proposed rule that would phase out the issuance of certificates allowing employers to pay some workers with disabilities less than the federal minimum wage, currently $7.25 per hour, for the work they perform.

WASHINGTON – The U.S. Department of Labor has obtained a consent judgment and order in federal court that recovers a total of more than $2.4 million in back wages and liquidated damages from Massachusetts and Pennsylvania healthcare staffing agencies that denied 341 employees overtime wages, including employees misclassified as independent contractors. 

WASHINGTON –The Biden-Harris administration today announced that the Department of Labor’s Wage and Hour Division recovered more than $1 billion in back wages and damages for our nation’s workers since the start of the Biden-Harris administration. The recoveries derive from investigations concluded by the division from Jan. 20, 2021, through Sept. 30, 2024.

WASHINGTON – The U.S. Department of Labor announced today that its Wage and Hour Division will offer online seminars for contractors, contracting agencies, unions, workers and other stakeholders on prevailing wage requirements in fiscal year 2025 for federally funded construction and service contracts.

WASHINGTON – The U.S. Department of Labor’s Wage and Hour Division and the New Jersey Department of Labor and Workforce Development have launched a joint strategic enforcement initiative to combat violations of federal and state child labor laws.

LEBANON, PA – The U.S. Department of Labor has obtained a summary judgment in federal court in its effort to recover more than $1 million in back wages and liquidated damages for 193 employees of a Pennsylvania home care agency and its owner, which failed to pay workers required minimum and overtime wages.

WASHINGTON – As the nation begins Labor Rights Week, the U.S. Department of Labor and the Republic of Colombia today announced the South American country has joined the Consular Partnership Program to raise awareness among Colombians working in the U.S. about regulations protecting them in America’s workplaces. 

WASHINGTON – U.S. Department of Labor officials and representatives from the Mexican Embassy and other diplomatic missions joined today to mark Labor Rights Week 2024 with an event promoting migrant workers’ rights and how the department is safeguarding these rights. 

WILKES-BARRE, PA – The U.S. Department of Labor has obtained a consent judgment to recover $1.3 million in back wages, withheld tips and liquidated damages for 51 workers employed by a Wilkes-Barre restaurant and its owner, whose pay practices illegally deprived workers of their full wages. 

WASHINGTON – The Department of Labor today announced its Wage and Hour Division will offer contracting agencies, contractors, unions, workers and other stakeholders an opportunity to attend an online seminar on Aug. 29 on requirements for paying prevailing wages on federally funded construction and service contracts.

PITTSBURGH – In one of the nation’s largest wage recovery judgments, a Pennsylvania federal court has awarded $35.8 million in overtime back wages and liquidated damages to 6,000 current and former workers employed by the operators of 15 residential skilled nursing, rehabilitation and assisted living facilities in western Pennsylvania that willfully denied them overtime pay.

DALLAS – In one of the largest recoveries of its kind, the U.S. Department of Labor has recouped more than $1.5 million in unpaid overtime wages and damages from a heating, ventilation and air conditioning company that deprived 430 technicians of their rights, protections and benefits under law by misclassifying them as independent contractors.

WASHINGTON - The U.S. Department of Labor’s Wage and Hour Administrator Jessica Looman issued the following statement in response to multiple inquiries regarding United Airlines’ leave policies:

NEW YORK – The U.S. Department of Labor has asked a federal court to stop improper employment practices by a Virginia-based IT staffing agency that bind employees to their jobs, extract huge sums from them if they leave the firm and forbid them from engaging in protected activity under federal law.

Read this news release in English. 

Read this news release En Español. 

COLLINGDALE, PA – The Department of Labor has obtained a consent judgment in federal court that orders a Delaware County home care agency to pay more than $1 million in back wages, liquidated damages and penalties after the department found the employer shortchanged 159 workers of their earned wages.