Since the development of workplace rights in the early 20th century, most attorneys general’s offices have been involved in workplace issues in their role as counsel to their state labor agency, representing the agency when it is sued or when court action is necessary to carry out a particular enforcement effort. While this is a vital role to play, there is potential for attorneys general to play a greater role in protecting their citizens in the workplace, working both side-by-side with their state labor agencies and independently taking actions. Some examples of action include wage and hour or other labor standards enforcement, as well as the enforcement of workers compensation and unemployment insurance requirements. On this page, we will provide resources that may be of use to AG offices currently exploring these issues.
Attorneys general have broad powers to investigate and prosecute wrongdoing in their states. This paper explores a versatile legal resource that is underutilized by many attorneys general: the False Claims Act (FCA). The federal FCA, and the parallel statutes that have been enacted in many states, impose civil liability on any person who submits a false claim for payment to the United States government.
In a joint lawsuit with the Federal Trade Commission, Arizona Attorney General Terry Goddard has accused the Tucson-based employment agency Government Careers, Inc. of masquerading as a legitimate government career center. As many as 10,000 people nationwide, after the agency guaranteed them federal jobs, signed up for study materials and employment counseling, which never were provided.
Shaw’s Supermarket has agreed to pay $103,000 to resolve an investigation into prescription overcharges at pharmacies under the grocery chain’s workers’ compensation program. Massachusetts Attorney General Martha Coakley initiated the investigation in 2008.
For the first time in the state’s history, a prevailing wage violator was placed on Missouri’s debarment list after being found guilty of falsifying documents when hired as a subcontractor. The guilty party was also sentenced to two years’ probation and has to pay restitution up to $3,400.
North Carolina community colleges yesterday banned illegal immigrants from seeking degrees, creating a new policy that is among the most restrictive in the US. Community college system President Scott Ralls said he based the decision on the advice of the state attorney general's office, which said last week that federal law appears to ban states from enrolling illegal immigrants in state colleges and universities. It comes despite the federal government's assertion last week that it has no authority over admissions at North Carolina colleges and despite Governor Mike Easley's request that the colleges remain open to all students.
Tennessee attorney general Robert Cooper supports house bill 2860, which requires jail officials at city- or county-operated facilities to make a “reasonable effort” to determine a detainee’s legal status through such actions as examining the suspect’s personal documents, claiming that the proposed legislation is constitutional.
Legal immigrants temporarily living in Michigan will be able to resume getting driver's licenses under terms of a bill passed Thursday by the state Legislature. The bill would allow temporary U.S. residents, including students and businesspeople, to get licenses.
The decision of the IRS to fine FedEx for its illegal independent contractor model follows a penalty exceeding $190,000 levied by the Attorney General of Massachusetts earlier in the week citing that FedEx Ground intentionally misclassified pickup and delivery drivers as independent contractors rather than employees. The fine confirms a fact long asserted by the Teamsters Union.
by Jennifer S. Brand, Chief of the Labor Bureau of the New York Office of Attorney General
The article presents a detailed plan for state attorneys general to enhance enforcement of state wage and hour laws. Brand, who is a graduate of both Barnard College and Columbia Law School, has 18 years of direct experience in the enforcement of state wage and hour laws and for three months served as a Research Scholar at Columbia Law School.
In this Article, Professor Estlund of New York University looks for ways not to combat the movement toward self-regulation in employment law— which she finds both inexorable and potentially promising—but to channel that movement so as both to fortify employee rights and labor standards, and to give employees a stronger voice in their own work lives and workplaces. Drawing on a range of regulatory theory and experience, she casts outside monitors—independent of employers, accountable to employees and the public— in a central role in a system of “monitored self-regulation.” The Article aims to bridge the divide between labor law and employment law—to find leverage within the dynamic law of workplace rights and regulations for the rejuvenation of employee voice, and to use new forms of employee voice to help realize workplace rights and improve labor standards.
In this article, Peter Romer-Friedman explores the varying roles that state governments have assigned to state attorneys general and labor departments to enforce state wage and hour laws, and presents three models of how states enforce wage statutes. After describing how New York Attorney General Eliot Spitzer has transformed enforcement in his state by strategically asserting and using his office's independent legal authority to enforce state wage laws, the article concludes that the ideal wage enforcement structure is one that grants both a state attorney general and a state labor department concurrent authority to enforce such laws. In 2006-2007, Romer-Friedman served as a Law Clerk for Circuit Judge Stephen Reinhardt, United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit.
Despite the general consensus among scholars that the National Labor Relations Board (NLRA) fails to protect workers’ ability to choose to organize and bargain collectively with their employers, Benjamin Sachs argues through a series of case studies that labor law is experiencing a renewal. No longer a regime defined by a single federal statute administered by a single federal agency, the article shows that American labor law is increasingly constituted by private processes, by state and local regulation, and by multiple federal statutes enforced by multiple actors.
