Underground in the Ironbound

ABRAHAM LINCOLN abhorred slavery not only from the moral point of view — revulsion at holding another human being in involuntary servitude — but also because it violated the fundamental American value that people must be paid for their labor.

 

Unfortunately, 145 years after Lincoln’s death, this fundamental American value is not extended to day laborers in Newark. Day laborers are all too often robbed of their wages, taking a serious toll on not just these workers and their families, but on all workers and law-abiding employers in New Jersey.

 

In a recent report entitled "Ironbound Underground: Wage Theft and Workplace Violations Among Day Laborers in Newark’s East Ward," students at the Center for Social Justice at Seton Hall University Law School showed a level of employer wage theft well above the national average. Ninety-six percent of day laborers in Newark’s Ironbound section had experienced some significant form of wage theft: some 88 percent reported not being paid overtime, 77 percent reported being paid below agreed-upon rates, and more than…

 

http://www.northjersey.com/news/opinions/more_columnists/100209739_Ordeal_of_day_laborers_in_Ironbound.html