Seattle Workers to Get Up to $10,000 Each in Back Wages

[napi21]

http://www.moneytalksnews.com/underpaid-seattle-workers-get-10000-back-wages/

According to the Associated Press, the companies, which include airport staffing firms, hotels, rental car agencies and parking lots in SeaTac, chose to disregard Seattle’s $15-an-hour minimum wage law, which passed in 2014, and continued to pay their workers below that wage. Now they’re being ordered to hand over $12 million to settle back pay lawsuits.

The AP says:

“Many employers questioned the law’s validity and declined to immediately follow it. The state Supreme Court upheld the measure a year ago in a 5-4 ruling, and attorneys for the workers began filing lawsuits seeking back pay for the roughly two years that the companies failed to pay $15 an hour.”
The AP says Menzies Aviation, which provides ramp workers and baggage handlers for Alaska Airlines at SeaTac, has agreed to an $8.2 million settlement — the largest so far — which will provide compensation for 738 former and current workers. Menzies was allegedly paying most of those workers $12 an hour instead of $15. The workers will get about $10,000 each after attorneys’ fees.

Don't ya just love it when some people think they cab just ignore a new law because they don't like it? Glad to see the courts enforcing this and I hope that many, many other states do the same. If our US Congress doesn't want to do this, then WE at the local gov't level WILL!