Defending Workers' Rights

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DEFENDING WORKERS’ RIGHTS

Attorney General Koster takes an active approach to protecting Missouri workers in the areas of prevailing wage, undocumented workers and misclassification of workers.

This aggressive stance has led to a number of lawsuits against employers who have disregarded Missouri’s prevailing wage laws, including the placement of an individual on a list barring him from working on government contracts for one year.  Attorney General Koster is the first Attorney General in Missouri history to place a contractor on the debarment list.  

Koster also has charged his workers’ rights unit with aggressively investigating and pursuing suspicions of undocumented workers.  In the past two years, his office has investigated complaints against 20 businesses accused of hiring unauthorized alien workers.  These investigations led to termination of the unauthorized workers and implementation of steps to verify the validity of workers’ documents.  Koster encourages individuals to file complaints with his office if they suspect undocumented workers are being used on any job site or business.

The Attorney General’s Office also is working to highlight the issue of misclassification of workers and to help identify cases in which businesses misclassify public works construction workers.