Labor Laws

Gov. Pete Wilson hinted Thursday that he might favor a bond issue--a form of government borrowing--over tax increases if the state needs to raise more money to finance recovery from the Northridge earthquake. The governor also unveiled two programs to help businesses rebuild more quickly, and issued an emergency order easing labor laws to make it easier for companies to place workers on flexible work schedules.

The El Monte factory where Thai immigrants were found in virtual slavery sewing garments for major U.S. manufacturers and retailers is just the tip of the iceberg. While the El Monte operation was certainly more egregious than most, paying far below the minimum wage for 17-hour workdays, sweatshops flourish throughout the garment industry's underground economy. In Los Angeles, most garment workers receive less than the $4.25-per-hour minimum wage and no overtime compensation.

A federal probe of Koreatown-area restaurants uncovered rampant violations of minimum wage and overtime laws, the U.S. Labor Department announced Friday. In a sweep of 43 randomly picked restaurants, investigators found that 200 workers were underpaid by $250,000. All but two of the restaurants had violated the labor laws, said regional spokesman Tino Serrano of the U.S. Labor Department.

It's hard to know where and how corporate executives draw the line between their legitimate quest for profits and ugly greed when they are fighting unions or slashing the size of their work force. But either way, workers almost always get trashed.

Some contractors who have received federal earthquake repair loans have repeatedly violated labor laws by underpaying their workers, but most have not been criminally prosecuted, documents and interviews show. Los Angeles housing officials who oversee the federally funded loan program have documented 17 cases of contractors who failed to pay 155 workers the "prevailing wages" required by state and federal labor laws.

President Clinton leaned only slightly to the left by nominating the moderate Stanford law professor William Gould IV as chairman of the National Labor Relations Board. Yet his appointment, as non-controversial as it should be, has triggered opposition from some corporate executives and right-wing congressional Republicans, who fear Gould may orchestrate opposition to their attempts to create a "union-free environment" in the United States.

It is nonsense to say that workers in our democratic country have the freedom to strike without fear of being of fired, when they can be "permanently replaced." Yet top Republicans in the Senate are promising to filibuster to death a bill that would end this absurdity. The measure, titled the Workplace Fairness Act, easily passed the House. A Senate majority supports it, including some Republicans. But even the GOP filibuster, which may well kill it, isn't enough for the union-haters.

After five years of working with babies on the set of "Dr. Quinn, Medicine Woman," nurse Laura Simmons was troubled last month when year-old twins were brought to work on the show at 8 a.m. and didn't go home until 9 p.m. The law required that the babies be on the set for no more than 4 1/2 hours. For a recent cable movie, a mother says that she brought her 3-month-old triplets to work as extras at 10 a.m. and said she was allowed to take them home at 7 p.m.

Labor law enforcement has declined markedly in California despite evidence of widespread violations in low-wage restaurant, janitorial and garment jobs, according to an analysis by the California Works Foundation. The labor-backed group found that by several measures--funding, staffing ratios and number of inspections--enforcement of laws covering wages, hours, health and safety was lower in 2000 than at the turn of each of the last three decades.

In black panties embellished with gold studs, rhinestones and tiny mirrors, Lexis sashayed down the stage. Soft lights glittered on her matching bra, her gold garter and her gold thigh-high boots. Around the club, a bouncer in a tuxedo picked up a wrapper someone had dropped on the soft carpet. A waitress, wearing a tuxedo-style blouse, solicited drink orders. "No pressure," the waitress said. "No two-drink minimum, nothing like that."