Lucero Herrera is Research Director at the UCLA Labor Center, which has been a source of pioneering research into wage theft in Los Angeles, along with the full spectrum of labor related-issues. The Labor Center has a long history of collaboration with labor organizations, a recent example of which was the February 2026 report, “Overworked & Under Pressure: A Study of Supermarket Workers in Los Angeles and Orange County Koreatowns,” in collaboration with KIWA (Koreatown Immigrant Workers Alliance) and AAPI Data. Wage theft reflects both aspects of the title of the report, which Herrara co-authored. She shared thoughts drawn from it for our Labor Day wage theft story. Here we present them in their entirety.
Random Lengths: Your study of Koreatown workers, “Overworked and Under Pressure,” isn’t concerned solely with wage theft, but with the overall experience of workers who are low-wage, often immigrant, with limited labor protections. So first, could you describe how the workers in your study are particularly vulnerable overall, both in an absolute sense, and in comparison with the local average?
Lucero Herrera: Workers in our study are vulnerable in several ways. Most are earning low wages and are immigrants. Many have little control over their schedules and their working conditions. They also work in an industry with high turnover, limited worker protections, and few opportunities to advance.
When we compare these workers to the broader workforce in the region, the differences are considerable. About 66-68% of supermarket workers earn low wages, compared to about one-third of all workers. While about 34-38% of supermarket workers are immigrants, 94% of the workers in our survey were foreign born.
Working conditions also contribute to that vulnerability. Workers described long hours, having difficulty taking breaks, and working in conditions that were sometimes unsafe. Nearly one in four workers in our survey said they had felt pressure to work faster than they felt was safe. About 1 in 5 experienced verbal abuse by managers, customers, or coworkers.
Workers in our study also described fear of retaliation and the lack of other opportunities as another factor to consider in terms of vulnerability. One of the cashiers we interviewed put it best when they say: “Out of necessity, one endures everything—even abuse.” Some shared that the fear of losing their job keeps them from speaking up.
RL: Second, how does the problem of wage theft fit into the overall picture derived from your report? How does it relate to low wages? Discrimination? Lack of worker power? etc.
Herrera: Wage theft is one of the key pieces driving precarity in the sector, along with low wages, unsafe working conditions, lack of benefits, discrimination and harassment, and the low rates of unionization. And these conditions can reinforce one another. When workers are already earning low wages, having wages stolen through unpaid overtime, missed breaks, or other forms of wage theft has a significant impact. And when workers are afraid of retaliation, they are less likely to speak up when workplace issues arise, which enables employers to perpetuate wage theft and other labor violations.
RL: Your report says that “About 40% of workers surveyed have experienced at least one form of wage theft, including being paid below the minimum wage, being denied meal or rest breaks, or not being paid for overtime work,” and that “The most common form of wage theft reported was not getting reimbursed for purchasing one’s uniform or supplies needed for work.”
This is on top of being significantly under-paid compared to other workers and receiving only insignificant raises over time. So, on the one hand, could you comment on the cumulative effect of wage theft in addition to everything else workers experience? (Both material and psychological)
The cumulative material effect is straightforward: workers are taking home less money than they should. Wage theft is taking money out of workers’ pockets, and often from the pockets of service-sector workers who earn the lowest wages.
The other nonmaterial effects are more widespread and pernicious. Wage theft affects workers’ sense of security and dignity at work. It impacts workers’ well-being, creating stress and anxiety that follows workers outside of work. It can mean not knowing if you are going to be able to cover this month’s rent, or whether you’ll have enough to feed your children.
There is also a broader impact on families and communities. Many studies (including this Health Impact Assessment) have shown that wage theft and low incomes are associated with housing and food insecurity, as well as high levels of stress and depression. One of the Koreatown supermarket workers shared how difficult it was to share a one-bedroom, overcrowded apartment for her and her children, but that she couldn’t afford to pay more with what she earned at the supermarket.
RL: While workers of all sorts suffer wage theft, your figures show that twice as many Guatemalan workers suffer compared to Korean workers, with Mexicans falling in between. We could spend a whole interview asking about what goes into this, the history behind it, how it plays out in the workplace, how different people see it, etc. But for you, as a researcher, what’s the most important thing we should take away in terms of understanding what’s going on & what to do about it?
Herrera: Supermarkets, and especially ethnic supermarkets, are an important source of employment for many immigrant workers, especially in communities like Koreatown where we see workers from many different backgrounds. They can provide relatively accessible jobs for workers with different levels of education and work experience. But the same workplace can reproduce inequalities based on race, ethnicity, language, or even immigration status. In our interviews, workers described discrimination in work assignments, schedules, and opportunities for promotion based on these intersecting identities, and even how these are weaponized to foster obedience and exploitation.
In sharing some of these figures, our aim was to illustrate that wage theft is not evenly experienced by all workers, but rather that some workers face greater exposure to these violations—either because of their nationality, gender, occupation, tenure, etc. And that has important implications for any interventions or enforcement efforts to improve conditions in these workplaces. Enforcement and worker education should reflect the diversity of the workforce, so that workers can access these resources in their language, in ways that are culturally appropriate and responsive to their lived experiences, and through the community orgs and institutions they trust.
RL: I’m particularly struck that some forms of wage theft, such as being denied meal or rest breaks, and not being paid for overtime work, could be connected with part-time work, unstable work schedules and other problems you identified. They all reflect unequal power relations with no respect for basic rights and needs of workers which show up in these different, but related forms of control over workers’ time without respect for law, or basic human needs. Would you agree with that assessment? And could you comment further?
Herrera: Agreed. These issues are reflecting the underlying precarity that characterizes low-wage sectors generally. Workers have limited power to negotiate the conditions of the work, including when they work, how much they work, and what they are expected to do while there.
We can see that lack of control in what happens during a shift. Workers are often expected to balance multiple responsibilities at once: stock shelves, assist customers, manage inventory, and staff check-out registers. If there are not enough workers on a shift, that work gets pushed onto the workers who are there.
Workers also don’t necessarily have control over how much they work. Many workers face unstable schedules, part-time hours, and schedules that vary significantly from week to week. Some take on multiple jobs to make ends meet. Others are working long hours: 78% reported working more than 35 hours per week, and nearly 30% work more than 40 hours per week. So you have workers dealing with unstable hours and schedules, and overwork, expected to work long hours when the employer needs them. And when they are at work, they may be expected to take on more tasks, work faster, or interrupt their meal breaks to assist with customers. So the common thread is how little control workers have over their working conditions.
RL: Given this common underlying cause, what are the limits of what wage theft enforcement can accomplish, on the one hand? And on the other, how could robust wage theft enforcement help alter the underlying dynamic (by encouraging workers, giving them a greater sense of dignity, recognition under law, etc)?
Herrera: Enforcement is key, but it cannot by itself address the conditions that enable employers to steal wages in the first place. If workers have little power in the workplace, enforcement after a violation occurred does not necessarily change the conditions that allowed it to happen. And too often, the burden still falls on the worker to come forward, document what happened, and pursue a claim, which can be challenging when workers fear retaliation, face language barriers, or do not trust the process. Long timelines can also discourage workers from coming forward.
But California has spearheaded innovative enforcement models that expand the reach of enforcement efforts. Strategic enforcement partnerships, for example, focus on large bad actors that can set the tone for whole industry sectors. Another innovative approach are in-depth worker outreach programs where workers are educated about their rights and receive support with their wage claim processes. These approaches make enforcement more accessible and sustainable for workers.
Enforcement is also strongest when workers also have ways to exercise that power collectively. Unions, worker centers, and community organizations can help workers learn about their rights, identify violations, and hold employers accountable.
RL: LA City council has just passed a measure strengthening wage theft enforcement in the city. How far do you think it could go in remedying the wage theft problems you identified for LA Koreatown workers? And how do fear it could fall short?
Herrera: The City Council’s measure would expand the scope of wage theft violations that the Los Angeles Office of Wage Standards can pursue, including overtime pay violations, denial of meal and rest breaks, and withholding pay.
Every year, 30,000 people file claims with the state for back pay–10k in the LA and Van Nuys offices of the Labor Commissioner alone. They wait more than 3 years for a hearing, sometimes as long as 5, during which their employers may close, transfer assets, or simply disappear. Expanding OWS’s authority puts more boots on the ground and gives workers a local, timely remedy for wage theft. It grants OWS subpoena power and requires strategic enforcement rather than a first-come, first-served complaint model. (Note: The specific language still needs to be drafted.)
Council ordered the City Attorney to report on the feasibility of a wide set of recommendations from the CLA’s office. Those include best practices to change employer behavior and collect back pay. This includes publicly available data about violations, subpoena authority to compel testimony and evidence from recalcitrant employers, individual and successor liability, and strategic, targeted enforcement that lets investigators move away from complaint-driven whack-a-mole to prioritize claims from high risk industries.
These tools are critical because it’s unrealistic that any enforcement agency will ever have enough staff to pose a credible threat of a compliance check in every workplace. Instead, a focus in strategic workplaces in high violation industries makes the best use of public dollars with the greatest impact.
Ultimately, the impact will depend on implementation. Workers need to know these tools exist, feel safe coming forward, and have accessible ways to report violations. The city also needs adequate staffing and resources for local enforcement to be successful.
RL: While changes in law–how its enforced as well as what’s on the books–are clearly key to ending wage theft, it’s just one part of the picture, and changes in law only happen as a result of people fighting for them, and changing expectations and assumptions about what is right and just. So what kinds of broader organizing efforts do you see as needed? And what kinds of changes in expectations and assumptions about what is right and just?
Herrera: We need to continue to expand and invest in workers’ rights education. Workers also need opportunities to come together, identify and talk about issues at their workplace, and organize around solutions. We saw a lot of promise during the COVID-19 pandemic, with the creation of the Los Angeles Department of Public Health’s Public Health Councils. This program provided workers in key industries, including supermarkets, with a space to discuss and identify ways to enforce public health standards in the workplace. That kind of collective organizing can help redress some of the power imbalances we’ve examined in our study. Unions are also an important part of that. Collective bargaining is the most effective tool workers have to counter-balance the power of the employer, build a collective voice, and build democracy in their workplace. It also creates an enforcement mechanism for workers to enforce their rights.